Chapter 8: What He Could Not Leave Behind
His sleep was usually very light. He figured it was most likely a residual of his military training and the dangerous times that had shaped his youth. Even now, as a man in his early thirties, the slightest noise or change in the environment would elicit a startle into wakefulness. Usually, his hand would still dart under the bed, where he had kept his gun as a young officer of OZ. Never mind that the gun had been replaced with a handful of dust bunnies ever since the war had ended. A textbook case of pavlovian reaction, this response was still hard to die.
That night, it was a set of flickering orange lights outside his window that triggered it. Milliardo Peacecraft squinted in the darkness of the bedroom, and felt his heart rate begin to calm down as he recognized the familiar surroundings. He groggily glanced at the alarm clock sitting on his bedside table. 2:00 AM.
He felt Noin stir and mutter something in her sleep, then settle down again in peaceful dreams. She gave the customary forceful tug on the blankets that left half his body exposed, and proceeded to cocoon herself in.
"Blanket hog..." Milliardo protested half-heartedly, and burrowed closer to align himself with his wife's body and partake in the stolen warmth. He was about to drift off to sleep once again, comfortably settled with her in the cocoon of quilts, when the orange beam lit up the bedroom once again. One second, then it subsided. It flashed two more times before realization began to dawn on Milliardo, and he got up to either confirm or deny the eerie feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Down by the side of the road, right in front of his driveway, was a bright orange tow truck, lights aglow in the otherwise motionless neighbourhood. It was time to end the glimpse and go home.
It should have been a comforting thought; after all hadn't he spent the first two days of his experience feeling like he was the butt of some higher entity's practical joke? Hadn't he wished, over and over again, to be back to normalcy, to the predictability of his life in Sanq? Yes, he conceded, but that was before everything the glimpse had shown him. And now that same higher entity wanted to send him back home, business as usual, as if nothing had ever happened. Never even consulting him in the first place as to where he would rather be...
He trudged downstairs as noiselessly as he could manage, anger mounting with each step, and hastily threw on a heavy coat and gloves, still in his pajamas and slippers.
The young man at the wheel did not seem surprised at all to see him come out of the house in less than perfect traveling attire. He rolled down the window and gave him a lopsided grin instead.
"Dude! Told ya I'd come back for you once you learned what you were here to learn," he greeted.
For his part, Milliardo stood his ground calmly, yet there was no mistaking his determination. It was written all over his face and stance.
"I'm not going back to Sanq," he stated flatly, as if leaving no room for debate, "I already am home. Thank you for your concern."
"Oh, brother... Here we go again," the young man groaned, bracing himself for another bout of Peacecraft stubbornness,
"Dude... that's not up for discussion. You knew the deal all along. You get sent here, you learn your lesson, you get sent back home..."
Seeing as his charge gave no indication that he was any more willing to cooperate, he reached for the truck's two-way radio, switched on the channel, and sent out his call for backup,
"T, you better get down here... This guy's hell-bent on staying and, quite frankly, I've put up with him long enough as it is..."
"Perhaps you'd like to get the chief of the Preventers arrested?" Milliardo inquired matter-of –factly, yet with a hefty dose of sarcasm, "Hmm, let me see... for refusing to leave his house and desert his family, not to mention resisting an... Oh, right... you're not an officer. You're a tow truck driver...". Yet the smugness was quickly wiped off his face as he witnessed, for the second time in the space of three days, as the young man's facial features morphed into the ghost of Treize Khushrenada.
"I suppose it's only fair that we meet again, since I sent you here," Treize announced, turning towards Milliardo. For his part, Milliardo could not help but scrunch up his brow in disbelief at seeing his aristocratic, always elegant mentor now dressed for the occasion in a blue mechanic's jumpsuit.
"Well?" Treize prompted, "I take it you liked what you saw, if you're so reluctant to leave. That's exactly what I was aiming for, by the way. And no, it's not because I'm a sadistic bastard, though right now you might be inclined to feel that way."
"How perceptive..." Milliardo muttered under his breath.
"I understand your anger, believe me. This," Treize made a sweeping gesture with his hand, "feels real. The air you breathe, the cold on your face, right down to the sense of belonging to a family of your own... it's all very realistic, isn't it? Mine was too..." he added, almost wistfully. That did not fail to capture Milliardo's interest.
"You had one of these... glimpses, too?" He found himself hesitating on the word, as though by saying it out loud he were acknowledging that his time on Mars had indeed been all a masterfully crafted illusion.
"Just after Leia died," Treize explained, sincere emotion managing to creep into his otherwise customary aloofness.
"My mother sent it to me. She wanted to show me what my life could be if I just walked away from it all and took custody of my baby. If I gave us both the chance at a normal life... Mine felt about a week long. It took me that much to get used to the idea of being a father, but by the end of it I didn't want to wake up either."
"You never mentioned any of that," Milliardo countered skeptically, "You mean to tell me that you had such a powerful experience, and yet it had absolutely no effect on your life once you were sent back?"
"Quite the contrary," Treize explained, "I came back with the knowledge that I loved my daughter more than anything in the world, and that she would always be my top priority. And I had to choose accordingly. At the time, we were living in a world that no child should ever have to experience, so if anything, the glimpse made me even more determined to give everything I had to bring on the change. I wanted her to grow up safe, and came to realize that running away from my responsibilities to the world would not bring that about. If anything, an association with my name would put her in even more danger. As much as I wanted to see her grow up and be involved in her life, I was in the position to help craft a better world for her, and I'd like to think that I did, in the end."
"But you must have known what she went through, growing up with that poor excuse for a grandfather," Milliardo protested. He could see Treize's reasoning for staying out of his daughter's life, and he respected him all the more for his sacrifice. But, having now experienced fatherhood himself, he could not bring himself to understand how he could have been able to bear it.
"No offense to Leia, but was there anyone else in that family that was even remotely fit to raise a child?"
"How could I just leave her there, righ?" Treize anticipated. His friend had indeed come a long way, if he understood so well what it felt like to love one's children more than one's own life.
"I knew I couldn't be a father to her as long as I was alive. So I made sure she had the next best thing once I was gone. There was nobody in the world that I trusted more than my dear Lady. So on December 24, 196, I sent her a glimpse of what her life would be like if she chose to rescue Mariemaia and adopt her as her daughter."
He ended that revelation with the most self-satisfied smile that had ever graced his features, and Milliardo could not help but salute his genius. He had always been curious as to what had prompted Anne to do such an about-face during the Christmas crisis. How she had gone from considering Mariemaia a threat to humanity, and therefore expendable, to waking up the next day hell-bent on rescuing her from the family who had victimized and brainwashed her. All the pieces of the puzzle certainly seemed to make sense in light of that...
And now it was his time to go back and make some life-altering choices of his own. If only...
"What about my children?" Milliardo asked, "They are part of the glimpse... Does that mean I will never see them again?"
"It is entirely up to you whether you do or not," Treize quipped, still feeling pretty smug, "You just haven't made it a priority to have them yet..."
"Oh, sure," Milliardo retorted, "you may have been a smooth-talking ladies' man, but I don't even know whether Noin's still single. Or whether she wants anything to do with me, for that matter..."
"True, you don't," Treize conceded, "but what is entirely up to you is how far you're willing to go to make her fall in love with you all over again..."
"Then I am ready," Milliardo declared, knowing that at least that much was within his control, "Just let me say good-bye to them first..."
"Take all the time that you need," Treize reassured with a friendly pat on the shoulder, "We'll go when you're done."
*************************
The first thing that Milliardo did upon re-entering the house was to sneak up into his and Noin's bedroom. He leaned on her sleeping form still curled up in the quilt, careful not to wake her up.
"See you very soon," he spoke softly to her, "Feel free to kick my ass, if you must. God knows I deserve it... But please give me another chance. I love you..."
With that, he placed a feather-light kiss on her temple. Saying good-bye to her was the easy part, knowing he would see, or at the very least, talk to her again immediately upon his return to Sanq.
He then made his way into his daughter's bedroom. He sat at the foot of her bed and stood watch over her, admiring every single part of the angelic face that he had grown to love so much. Their miracle girl, one of the first babies to be born on Mars, back when it was still very much a work in progress... He told her of how special and how loved she was, and how much she had managed to teach him in such a short time.
As soon as he felt himself grow sleepy once more, he moved to his son's nursery. He spent the rest of the night contemplating the sleeping toddler who could have been the carbon copy of himself as a baby. He tried to commit every single detail to memory, from how soft his blonde peach fuzz felt under his hand, to that lovely, indefinable angel scent that all babies seem to have, to how quickly his hugs had managed to melt even his cold, skeptical, self-damaged heart.
Finally, he surrendered to a dreamless sleep in the rocking chair beside the crib.
*****************************
The first thing he became aware of was the radio alarm clock going off to the notes of "Little Drummer Boy" being sung by the Royal St. Mary's Children's Choir, and he knew right away that he must be back in Sanq.
A feeling of emptiness and gloom settled into his stomach as he opened his eyes and recognized the impeccably stylish, yet impersonal surroundings of his penthouse apartment.
9:00 AM on Christmas day, he read from the alarm clock's LCD display. The last three days on Mars had indeed been just one night's dream.
"But you're wrong... it's so much more than that," a childlike voice within him protested with all its might, "You have learned; everything else is up to you!"
And he knew right away that everything hinged on whether he could find that crumpled note with Noin's phone number, the very same one that he had foolishly tossed in the garbage the night before.
He got ready in record time, then dashed out the door and drove like a madman to his office. If he was lucky, the cleaners might not have come by to empty his waste bin yet...
He heaved a huge sigh of relief upon seeing that his office was just as messy as he had left it the night before. He resolutely pulled his right sleeve up, bent under his desk, and proceeded to plunge his hand into the waste basket, cringing in disgust as he fished around for the small note among empty Starbucks cups, candy bar wrappers, and slimy banana peels.
Dolores must have thought that Mr. Peacecraft had finally lost all his marbles when she poked her head into his office armed with bucket and mop, and saw him sitting on the floor with the contents of his waste bin spilled all around, an expression of pure triumph as he beheld a rather wrinkled piece of paper in his hand.
It took him a good half-hour to work up the courage to dial the number. He still had no idea what he was going to say to her once she picked up. Just the thought of the rest of his future resting on whatever words came out of his mouth right that moment was enough to keep his fingers from working properly on the keys. He was fully aware of his heart rate as he listened to the tone, waiting for her to pick up. Twice, three, four times it rang, each ring causing his stomach to do another backflip. Then she picked up.
"Thank you for calling CavalliStudio," a female voice that he didn't recognize as Noin's spoke into the receiver, "We are closed for the Holidays until January 2nd, but please leave us a message and your contact information, and we will get back to you. Thank you, and have a wonderful holiday season!"
For a second, he wondered whether he might have the wrong number, all hopes of ever reconnecting with her wavering momentarily, until the name clicked in his memory.
Noin's mother was National Geographic photographer Chiara Cavalli, who happened to have a studio right in Sanq. He recalled from their days at the Academy how Noin always spent the Christmas holidays with her father and stepmother, on accounts of her mother always being busy on some important photo shoot or other. But the summers were their quality time together. Mother and daughter would go freelance, pack their equipment, and travel the world, Noin acting as her mother's apprentice.
He recalled how much he had envied her life at the time, seeing her come back to school tanned and happy, with countless stories of her travel adventures with a mother who acted more like a big sister, and stacks of pictures to prove them all true. While all the other students moped and groaned about the start of the new semester, he spent his summers feeling like Harry Potter at the Dursleys', looking forward to the start of school, when he would be reunited with his best friend, and maybe soak up some of her happiness and relative normalcy.
He deduced that Noin must be staying at her mother's artsy loft-studio while in town, and hastily left a message with his own cell phone number before the voice mail system had a chance to cut him off.
Now he could do nothing but wait for her to call him back... if she really did want to reconnect with him. Overall, that put him in a very uncomfortable spot, where he had little or no control.
He decided that, since he couldn't very well show up on her doorstep without looking like some kind of stalker, he might as well do something else to pass the time until she called. He drove back home, put on his snow gear, and headed for the local mountains to enjoy a day on the ski slopes. Maybe the physical exercise would calm his nerves enough so that he could at least sound semi-coherent once she did call.
What he did not bank on was one of the signal towers that normally serviced the resort's cell phone users to be temporarily down. He spent until past noon skiing down every run like a maniac, before he decided to grab a bite to eat and found himself within cell phone range again. It was just as he bit down on his focaccia sandwich that his cell phone beeped, signaling to him that he had a new voice mail.
"Tag, you're it," the all-too familiar voice greeted, as his heart began to race and his stomach did flip-flops, "It's Noin. Sorry I didn't pick up earlier... didn't realize I'd given you my mom's business number instead of her personal one... duh... Anyway... you can call me back at the same number, and I promise this time I'll pick up! Thanks and talk to you later!"
Well, she didn't sound like she was too mad at him... In fact, her tone of voice and phone-tag joke had been outright friendly. Maybe she didn't hate his guts after all...
Deciding not to take any more chances with spotty cell phone coverage, he resolved that, since she had called him back and expressed her desire to connect with him, it might not be too inappropriate for him to drop by the studio instead.
Once again, he put the pedal to the metal, quickly changed out of his ski gear into something more appropriate for meeting the ex-girlfriend whom he had recently discovered he was still very much hung up on, and then walked the few blocks from his apartment to the photographer studio, all the while thanking whoever had invented the Internet for making it so easy to find the address.
To be continued...
His sleep was usually very light. He figured it was most likely a residual of his military training and the dangerous times that had shaped his youth. Even now, as a man in his early thirties, the slightest noise or change in the environment would elicit a startle into wakefulness. Usually, his hand would still dart under the bed, where he had kept his gun as a young officer of OZ. Never mind that the gun had been replaced with a handful of dust bunnies ever since the war had ended. A textbook case of pavlovian reaction, this response was still hard to die.
That night, it was a set of flickering orange lights outside his window that triggered it. Milliardo Peacecraft squinted in the darkness of the bedroom, and felt his heart rate begin to calm down as he recognized the familiar surroundings. He groggily glanced at the alarm clock sitting on his bedside table. 2:00 AM.
He felt Noin stir and mutter something in her sleep, then settle down again in peaceful dreams. She gave the customary forceful tug on the blankets that left half his body exposed, and proceeded to cocoon herself in.
"Blanket hog..." Milliardo protested half-heartedly, and burrowed closer to align himself with his wife's body and partake in the stolen warmth. He was about to drift off to sleep once again, comfortably settled with her in the cocoon of quilts, when the orange beam lit up the bedroom once again. One second, then it subsided. It flashed two more times before realization began to dawn on Milliardo, and he got up to either confirm or deny the eerie feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Down by the side of the road, right in front of his driveway, was a bright orange tow truck, lights aglow in the otherwise motionless neighbourhood. It was time to end the glimpse and go home.
It should have been a comforting thought; after all hadn't he spent the first two days of his experience feeling like he was the butt of some higher entity's practical joke? Hadn't he wished, over and over again, to be back to normalcy, to the predictability of his life in Sanq? Yes, he conceded, but that was before everything the glimpse had shown him. And now that same higher entity wanted to send him back home, business as usual, as if nothing had ever happened. Never even consulting him in the first place as to where he would rather be...
He trudged downstairs as noiselessly as he could manage, anger mounting with each step, and hastily threw on a heavy coat and gloves, still in his pajamas and slippers.
The young man at the wheel did not seem surprised at all to see him come out of the house in less than perfect traveling attire. He rolled down the window and gave him a lopsided grin instead.
"Dude! Told ya I'd come back for you once you learned what you were here to learn," he greeted.
For his part, Milliardo stood his ground calmly, yet there was no mistaking his determination. It was written all over his face and stance.
"I'm not going back to Sanq," he stated flatly, as if leaving no room for debate, "I already am home. Thank you for your concern."
"Oh, brother... Here we go again," the young man groaned, bracing himself for another bout of Peacecraft stubbornness,
"Dude... that's not up for discussion. You knew the deal all along. You get sent here, you learn your lesson, you get sent back home..."
Seeing as his charge gave no indication that he was any more willing to cooperate, he reached for the truck's two-way radio, switched on the channel, and sent out his call for backup,
"T, you better get down here... This guy's hell-bent on staying and, quite frankly, I've put up with him long enough as it is..."
"Perhaps you'd like to get the chief of the Preventers arrested?" Milliardo inquired matter-of –factly, yet with a hefty dose of sarcasm, "Hmm, let me see... for refusing to leave his house and desert his family, not to mention resisting an... Oh, right... you're not an officer. You're a tow truck driver...". Yet the smugness was quickly wiped off his face as he witnessed, for the second time in the space of three days, as the young man's facial features morphed into the ghost of Treize Khushrenada.
"I suppose it's only fair that we meet again, since I sent you here," Treize announced, turning towards Milliardo. For his part, Milliardo could not help but scrunch up his brow in disbelief at seeing his aristocratic, always elegant mentor now dressed for the occasion in a blue mechanic's jumpsuit.
"Well?" Treize prompted, "I take it you liked what you saw, if you're so reluctant to leave. That's exactly what I was aiming for, by the way. And no, it's not because I'm a sadistic bastard, though right now you might be inclined to feel that way."
"How perceptive..." Milliardo muttered under his breath.
"I understand your anger, believe me. This," Treize made a sweeping gesture with his hand, "feels real. The air you breathe, the cold on your face, right down to the sense of belonging to a family of your own... it's all very realistic, isn't it? Mine was too..." he added, almost wistfully. That did not fail to capture Milliardo's interest.
"You had one of these... glimpses, too?" He found himself hesitating on the word, as though by saying it out loud he were acknowledging that his time on Mars had indeed been all a masterfully crafted illusion.
"Just after Leia died," Treize explained, sincere emotion managing to creep into his otherwise customary aloofness.
"My mother sent it to me. She wanted to show me what my life could be if I just walked away from it all and took custody of my baby. If I gave us both the chance at a normal life... Mine felt about a week long. It took me that much to get used to the idea of being a father, but by the end of it I didn't want to wake up either."
"You never mentioned any of that," Milliardo countered skeptically, "You mean to tell me that you had such a powerful experience, and yet it had absolutely no effect on your life once you were sent back?"
"Quite the contrary," Treize explained, "I came back with the knowledge that I loved my daughter more than anything in the world, and that she would always be my top priority. And I had to choose accordingly. At the time, we were living in a world that no child should ever have to experience, so if anything, the glimpse made me even more determined to give everything I had to bring on the change. I wanted her to grow up safe, and came to realize that running away from my responsibilities to the world would not bring that about. If anything, an association with my name would put her in even more danger. As much as I wanted to see her grow up and be involved in her life, I was in the position to help craft a better world for her, and I'd like to think that I did, in the end."
"But you must have known what she went through, growing up with that poor excuse for a grandfather," Milliardo protested. He could see Treize's reasoning for staying out of his daughter's life, and he respected him all the more for his sacrifice. But, having now experienced fatherhood himself, he could not bring himself to understand how he could have been able to bear it.
"No offense to Leia, but was there anyone else in that family that was even remotely fit to raise a child?"
"How could I just leave her there, righ?" Treize anticipated. His friend had indeed come a long way, if he understood so well what it felt like to love one's children more than one's own life.
"I knew I couldn't be a father to her as long as I was alive. So I made sure she had the next best thing once I was gone. There was nobody in the world that I trusted more than my dear Lady. So on December 24, 196, I sent her a glimpse of what her life would be like if she chose to rescue Mariemaia and adopt her as her daughter."
He ended that revelation with the most self-satisfied smile that had ever graced his features, and Milliardo could not help but salute his genius. He had always been curious as to what had prompted Anne to do such an about-face during the Christmas crisis. How she had gone from considering Mariemaia a threat to humanity, and therefore expendable, to waking up the next day hell-bent on rescuing her from the family who had victimized and brainwashed her. All the pieces of the puzzle certainly seemed to make sense in light of that...
And now it was his time to go back and make some life-altering choices of his own. If only...
"What about my children?" Milliardo asked, "They are part of the glimpse... Does that mean I will never see them again?"
"It is entirely up to you whether you do or not," Treize quipped, still feeling pretty smug, "You just haven't made it a priority to have them yet..."
"Oh, sure," Milliardo retorted, "you may have been a smooth-talking ladies' man, but I don't even know whether Noin's still single. Or whether she wants anything to do with me, for that matter..."
"True, you don't," Treize conceded, "but what is entirely up to you is how far you're willing to go to make her fall in love with you all over again..."
"Then I am ready," Milliardo declared, knowing that at least that much was within his control, "Just let me say good-bye to them first..."
"Take all the time that you need," Treize reassured with a friendly pat on the shoulder, "We'll go when you're done."
*************************
The first thing that Milliardo did upon re-entering the house was to sneak up into his and Noin's bedroom. He leaned on her sleeping form still curled up in the quilt, careful not to wake her up.
"See you very soon," he spoke softly to her, "Feel free to kick my ass, if you must. God knows I deserve it... But please give me another chance. I love you..."
With that, he placed a feather-light kiss on her temple. Saying good-bye to her was the easy part, knowing he would see, or at the very least, talk to her again immediately upon his return to Sanq.
He then made his way into his daughter's bedroom. He sat at the foot of her bed and stood watch over her, admiring every single part of the angelic face that he had grown to love so much. Their miracle girl, one of the first babies to be born on Mars, back when it was still very much a work in progress... He told her of how special and how loved she was, and how much she had managed to teach him in such a short time.
As soon as he felt himself grow sleepy once more, he moved to his son's nursery. He spent the rest of the night contemplating the sleeping toddler who could have been the carbon copy of himself as a baby. He tried to commit every single detail to memory, from how soft his blonde peach fuzz felt under his hand, to that lovely, indefinable angel scent that all babies seem to have, to how quickly his hugs had managed to melt even his cold, skeptical, self-damaged heart.
Finally, he surrendered to a dreamless sleep in the rocking chair beside the crib.
*****************************
The first thing he became aware of was the radio alarm clock going off to the notes of "Little Drummer Boy" being sung by the Royal St. Mary's Children's Choir, and he knew right away that he must be back in Sanq.
A feeling of emptiness and gloom settled into his stomach as he opened his eyes and recognized the impeccably stylish, yet impersonal surroundings of his penthouse apartment.
9:00 AM on Christmas day, he read from the alarm clock's LCD display. The last three days on Mars had indeed been just one night's dream.
"But you're wrong... it's so much more than that," a childlike voice within him protested with all its might, "You have learned; everything else is up to you!"
And he knew right away that everything hinged on whether he could find that crumpled note with Noin's phone number, the very same one that he had foolishly tossed in the garbage the night before.
He got ready in record time, then dashed out the door and drove like a madman to his office. If he was lucky, the cleaners might not have come by to empty his waste bin yet...
He heaved a huge sigh of relief upon seeing that his office was just as messy as he had left it the night before. He resolutely pulled his right sleeve up, bent under his desk, and proceeded to plunge his hand into the waste basket, cringing in disgust as he fished around for the small note among empty Starbucks cups, candy bar wrappers, and slimy banana peels.
Dolores must have thought that Mr. Peacecraft had finally lost all his marbles when she poked her head into his office armed with bucket and mop, and saw him sitting on the floor with the contents of his waste bin spilled all around, an expression of pure triumph as he beheld a rather wrinkled piece of paper in his hand.
It took him a good half-hour to work up the courage to dial the number. He still had no idea what he was going to say to her once she picked up. Just the thought of the rest of his future resting on whatever words came out of his mouth right that moment was enough to keep his fingers from working properly on the keys. He was fully aware of his heart rate as he listened to the tone, waiting for her to pick up. Twice, three, four times it rang, each ring causing his stomach to do another backflip. Then she picked up.
"Thank you for calling CavalliStudio," a female voice that he didn't recognize as Noin's spoke into the receiver, "We are closed for the Holidays until January 2nd, but please leave us a message and your contact information, and we will get back to you. Thank you, and have a wonderful holiday season!"
For a second, he wondered whether he might have the wrong number, all hopes of ever reconnecting with her wavering momentarily, until the name clicked in his memory.
Noin's mother was National Geographic photographer Chiara Cavalli, who happened to have a studio right in Sanq. He recalled from their days at the Academy how Noin always spent the Christmas holidays with her father and stepmother, on accounts of her mother always being busy on some important photo shoot or other. But the summers were their quality time together. Mother and daughter would go freelance, pack their equipment, and travel the world, Noin acting as her mother's apprentice.
He recalled how much he had envied her life at the time, seeing her come back to school tanned and happy, with countless stories of her travel adventures with a mother who acted more like a big sister, and stacks of pictures to prove them all true. While all the other students moped and groaned about the start of the new semester, he spent his summers feeling like Harry Potter at the Dursleys', looking forward to the start of school, when he would be reunited with his best friend, and maybe soak up some of her happiness and relative normalcy.
He deduced that Noin must be staying at her mother's artsy loft-studio while in town, and hastily left a message with his own cell phone number before the voice mail system had a chance to cut him off.
Now he could do nothing but wait for her to call him back... if she really did want to reconnect with him. Overall, that put him in a very uncomfortable spot, where he had little or no control.
He decided that, since he couldn't very well show up on her doorstep without looking like some kind of stalker, he might as well do something else to pass the time until she called. He drove back home, put on his snow gear, and headed for the local mountains to enjoy a day on the ski slopes. Maybe the physical exercise would calm his nerves enough so that he could at least sound semi-coherent once she did call.
What he did not bank on was one of the signal towers that normally serviced the resort's cell phone users to be temporarily down. He spent until past noon skiing down every run like a maniac, before he decided to grab a bite to eat and found himself within cell phone range again. It was just as he bit down on his focaccia sandwich that his cell phone beeped, signaling to him that he had a new voice mail.
"Tag, you're it," the all-too familiar voice greeted, as his heart began to race and his stomach did flip-flops, "It's Noin. Sorry I didn't pick up earlier... didn't realize I'd given you my mom's business number instead of her personal one... duh... Anyway... you can call me back at the same number, and I promise this time I'll pick up! Thanks and talk to you later!"
Well, she didn't sound like she was too mad at him... In fact, her tone of voice and phone-tag joke had been outright friendly. Maybe she didn't hate his guts after all...
Deciding not to take any more chances with spotty cell phone coverage, he resolved that, since she had called him back and expressed her desire to connect with him, it might not be too inappropriate for him to drop by the studio instead.
Once again, he put the pedal to the metal, quickly changed out of his ski gear into something more appropriate for meeting the ex-girlfriend whom he had recently discovered he was still very much hung up on, and then walked the few blocks from his apartment to the photographer studio, all the while thanking whoever had invented the Internet for making it so easy to find the address.
To be continued...