It was about a month before the wedding date that he came home and found her crying. At first he couldn't place the strangled noises; certainly they were sounds he had never associated with her. They were coming from his study--the room that had been John's bedroom. When he opened the door, he saw her with her back to him, the painting from their second date out on the desk and the photograph John had taken of her clutched in one hand.
Monty loved her enough to pretend he hadn't seen. He backed out and closed the door.
Apparently she loved him enough not to accept the tacit offer. She didn't turn, but she called to him. "Monty, would you do something for me?"
He went to her and knelt beside her, not quite touching her, feeling about as useless as he ever had. "Now that's the stupidest question I've heard all week."
She smiled through her tears and took his hand. He grabbed her arm and pulled it up under his chin.
"Can we go to the shore? Now?"
Understanding without comprehension began to form--or maybe it had already formed a while back. In any event, Monty's words were not a guess. "You want to say goodbye."
He didn't mean to John. He was fairly sure she didn't either.
She hesitated. "Yes. And if I were to ask you to wait in the flitter--?"
"Lassie, now that's the second stupidest question. You're on a roll today. Did I not just say I'd do anything?"
She flung her arms around his neck and hugged him. "I love you."
"And I am so vera, vera, glad."
When they broke apart, Monty picked up the canvas. "It's rather a nice picture, really. Can we frame it and put it up?"
"Sure. I'd like that. I miss the ocean. Hang it where ever you think best."
"You're the design expert," he teased.
"He was your friend." She stood and tucked the little photograph into her bra. As he got another glance at it, he saw something gray out in the ocean. Turtles? Maybe seabirds on the water? Whatever it was, she concealed the photo so fast he couldn't really be sure.
The trip to the seashore was uneventful. She stayed less than an hour. As promised, he stayed in the flitter. He even closed his eyes. He didn't ask her any questions when she came back with her eyes puffy and her nose reddened, except whether she cared to go eat. She said, no, that she wasn't hungry, even for their favorite restaurant.
They went back home and made sweet, slow, love instead.
One day the doorchime rang. It was a small parcel addressed to Lesa, delivered by courier, no reply, no return address. She cut open the weatherguard wrapping and gasped as she picked up the contents of the box. It was a set of perfectly matched pearls, each one bigger than a pea.
"They're beautiful," said Monty, leaning over her shoulder. "They're real?"
"Family heirlooms," she said running them through her fingers. "Over five hundred years old."
He picked up the strand. "The clasp is Jeluronized gold. They didn't have that five hundred years ago."
"Pearls on silk have to be periodically re-strung and re-knotted. I suppose they replaced the clasp one of those times. The pearls are natural though, taken from open-water oysters."
"You could just use synthaline and save all the trouble."
She took them back. "The natural beauty is their attraction. Synthetic fiber would spoil that. Help me put them on."
"You won't think of it as spoiling when the silk rots through and they spill all over the floor." He fastened the clasp in the back of her neck.
"One, that's what the knotting is for. And two, I will be restringing them to make sure that that doesn't happen."
"They must love you very much to send you beauties like these."
She stroked the beads at her neck. "Yes."
Monty licked his lips. "So don't you think--"
"No." she turned off her computer, went into the bedroom and shut the door.