Chapter 17
Dorian:
December. After our adventurous Thanksgiving night, the rest of Thanksgiving weekend passed fairly quietly and much to my relief, peacefully.
Cassie, Andrew, Blair, Kelly, Zane, Lance and Jack braved the nearby mall crowds to do a bit of Black Friday shopping late Friday morning.
I myself slept late Friday morning, then read for a few hours, still a bit drained from Thursday night.
I'm not sure I'll ever understand how most people I know can go through an active night, then get up early the next morning and plunge back into the world of people.
After a night like Thursday night or after a very busy day or big event, I feel so drained, often strained and need more time to regroup alone.
Cole is likely to be released from the hospital next week and go into a physical rehab facility. He's likely to be there two or three months.
Marty has a slight bout of hypothermia, frostbite on two fingers and a brief flare up of lupus, so she's likely to stay in the hospital as long as Cole before she can go home.
Addie finds out through a call to the hospital late that week that it's John McBain and Bo Buchanan who take her back home to Llanview once she recovers and is released.
Starr tells us that although Marty talked about Cole still being alive, no one in Llanview, not even John or Bo believed her.
Much to my relief, I only have one nightmare that week, one not too hideous.
Washington is bright now with holiday decorations all over the city and the National Christmas tree will be up and lit next week.
By late in the week, the weather has turned from cool and autumny to chillier with more windy weather.
That Friday evening a week after Thanksgiving, Risa and I help the house staffers decorate our own home for the holidays.
Two staffers eat with us that night and afterwards, the four of us put up a blue and silver decorated tree in our living room with a silver tinsel koosh ball on top.
The following week is Carlotta's birthday, so I invite her to meet me to have dinner at the restaurant of her choice the following Saturday.
To my delight, she has moved out of Llanview to Delaware this past week and is managing one of her diners there.
So, we are able to talk during a work break and agree to meet in Baltimore where I offer to treat her to dinner at one of her favorite restaurants, a Mediterranean place.
I invite Risa, but she has a study session for finals with three friends that entire weekend.
Carlotta and I are meeting at one, so I decide to drive up to Baltimore a bit early, so I have time to look around.
Parking at the restaurant about a half hour early, I decide to walk around the block, enjoying the brisk air and looking at the holiday decorations.
Today is not windy and it's sunny, but it is chilly. I wonder if we'll get snow for the holidays this year...Hanukkah was over Thanksgiving this year.
At ten to one, I head back to the restaurant and let the maître d' know to expect a party of two.
Unlike Tina and the other Buchanan-Lord clowns back in Llanview, I know Carlotta won't be late without an excellent reason.
There is about a fifteen-minute wait for a table, so I sit in the vestibule, which has an elegant Turkish mural on the high ceiling that I admire.
Five minutes later, a familiar voice calls, "Dorian...?"
Turning, I am delighted to see Carlotta coming into the vestibule, smiling widely, her beautiful white teeth showing.
"Carlotta!" I crow, standing up. "Happy birthday!"
We hug for a long minute, happy to see each other for the first time in a couple of years.
"It's so good to see you again!" Carlotta tells me. "I'm so glad things are better for you, especially since you moved to DC."
Carlotta looks great...she's wearing a green oxford shirt and long, loose dark green skirt paired with silver earrings.
Her wavy black hair is shoulder-length with half-bangs parted in the middle. She has dark brown eyes like me.
A few minutes later, the maître d' leads us to a table near a wide window.
The restaurant is somewhat busy, but thankfully not all the tables are full and the tables are not too close together.
Boughs of holly and little red adorn the posts and the back wall and Rocking Around the Christmas Tree is playing softly in the background.
It's so good seeing Carlotta again...she was one of the few people in Llanview who never judged me and who never joined in the gossip about others.
"Happy birthday, Carlotta," I say, handing her the gift I have for her and a card.
"Ohhh, thank you," Carlotta gushes.
The gift is a beautiful steel vase that can also double as a picture frame.
"Thank you, Dorian..." Carlotta comes over and we hug again, then sit.
Over drinks, we catch each other up on our families and our work life.
Carlotta is spending the holidays in Gettysburg where her oldest son Antonio is now living.
I'm glad to hear that her younger son Cristian is coming to Gettysburg from Madrid to spend the Christmas holiday with them. Cristian is now teaching art at a university in Spain.
I tell her about my daughters, my grandchildren and how the rest of my family is doing.
We've been in touch through texting, phone and e-mail, but really nothing replaces face-to-face in-person talking with a dear friend.
"So..." Carlotta reaches over and I let her hold my hand a minute after we order lunch. "Are you feeling better these days? Is the therapy helping?"
I nod. "Dr. Yardstein has been good...she makes it easy to talk and we've started EMDR just this week."
"I'm glad to hear that," Carlotta tells me. "Dorian...back in Llanview...I often felt bad for you...I wish I could have done more to help and support you, especially with the Buchanans."
"Thanks..." I say softly, touched.
"I cried my eyes out when you were wrongly convicted back in 1994...I knew you never killed Victor..." Carlotta says. "I know I should have gone to court and said something...for years even after you were released and cleared, I felt like I had collaborated by staying silent and passive...I apologize for it..."
"Oh, Carlotta..." Tears well in my eyes and I touch her hand. "Thanks...but you didn't do anything wrong...there really was nothing you could do...the Buchanans would have come after you and maybe your family."
"Perhaps," Carlotta's eyes glisten with tears too. "I still sometimes feel bad that I didn't do more...offer more support."
"You offered great support emotionally for me," I reassure her. "Even when I was in jail, you kept my place running and in great shape...thanks for that...and now that we're both out of Llanview, we can go on with real life."
"I'm so glad you've reunited your family," Carlotta says as we wipe our eyes. "Even when my aunt retired and I took over taking care of your home, I knew that you were different from most of the wealthy crowd...you seemed to think more deeply than most of the others."
"And Dorian..." Carlotta adds. "You were there for me even with all you were going through...I always admired your strength...when Antonio and I had trouble...when Cristian went through the rebellious phase and I feared he was into the gangs, when I feared he would be pulled into the Buchanan dramas, you always offered me valuable emotional support...thank you."
"Oh...you're welcome," I say, my heart feeling full.
Just then our lunches arrive...a chicken and vegetable Iranian dish for me and a Turkish rice mix dish for Carlotta.
I can see why Carlotta likes this place...not only is the food wonderful, but so is the ambiance.
The window offers us a view of part of the harbor with a shore and part of the city.
The music is a mix of traditional Middle Eastern music and holiday music...even some of the Christmas songs are in Arabic.
It's so nice just relaxing over lunch or dinner with a good friend or family member.
It strikes me now how rare that was back in Llanview. Even whenever I was at lunch, tea or dinner with Cassie, Blair, Kelly or Starr, I was always on guard, especially in public.
It was essentially a war zone back in Llanview, where I always had to remain vigilant for an attack.
Now in DC and here in Baltimore, I can let down my guard without fear of an attack, without fear of drama spoiling this time.
I realize how small the Buchanans' world actually is, how compressed it truly is in a small town that few people have even heard of.
Back in the 1980s and 1990s, the Buchanans, their clique and Llanview seemed larger than life...it most likely still seems that way to Viki, Natalie and Jessica.
I speculate now that most DC residents have never even heard of Llanview.
As we wind down our lunch, I mention these thoughts to Carlotta, who smiles.
"I remember when Cristian was dating Jessica," Carlotta says. "I feared that he would be pulled into the Buchanan whirlpool, especially with Clint and Viki's marital problems and Viki's mental instability."
"I remember that also," I say. "You were a wonderful mother figure for Jessica when Viki couldn't be there for her...I wonder if Jessica remembers that today."
"The truth?" Carlotta says. "Probably not now that she seems to have her mother's instability and is still fighting with her sister...I'll never forget that November 1995...Cristian was at a dance with Jessica's country club crowd...drama broke out and they had to leave early...your Blair was getting married at the time...you were so worried about Blair getting into that family."
"You knew how nervous I was about that marriage?" My eyebrows shoot up in a bit of surprise.
"Yes," Carlotta nods. "I'm glad it worked out...I'm glad Blair is happier these days...and I'm glad Todd has settled down."
"Me too," I say. "I'm glad we're not at each other's throats these days."
Todd and I had numerous catfights over the years until shortly before I moved to DC...now we're on better terms.
We're not best friends, but we get along a lot better than we used to, which I know relieves Blair, Starr and Hope.
Although Todd returns to Llanview from time to time to visit Viki, Natalie and Jessica and was at Clint's funeral, he has not been pulled too much into the Buchanan whirlpool of drama.
The waitress comes to take our dessert orders...I order a caramel cheesecake and Carlotta orders a peanut butter chocolate pie.
When the dessert comes back, a group of waitstaffers sings Happy birthday to Carlotta, which delights her.
As we dig in, Carlotta wonders out loud if we'll get snow for the Christmas holidays.
"It would be nice," I say, glancing out at the now-bare trees that seem to be waiting for snow.
"I remember the first time I saw snow," Carlotta tells me as we eat. "I was eighteen, working at a diner in Philadelphia...I looked out and saw the flakes...once it covered the ground, I walked outside to touch it just to see what it felt like."
"In Canton, we had snow most years for the holidays," I smile. "When my grandmother was alive and she came, my sisters and I would be playing outside and ran into her arms with snow flying all over...it often was one of the few times Mama was playing the piano and happy."
Carlotta knows about my childhood and about my parents' instability and about Charlotte Stonecliff.
After having a lovely dessert and tea with a beautiful rendition of Oh, Come All Ye Faithful playing in the background, I pay the check, then we get up to head home.
I walk with her to her car, we hug, I bid her a happy birthday one last time before she heads home.
On my own drive home, I feel so much more peaceful and satisfied than I have for a long, long time.
Back in Llanview, Viki and Clint along with some of their clique would say that I was the way I was because I was "lonely" and to be pitied.
It used to irk me to no end when Viki would swoon how "sorry" she felt for me.
Although I never wanted or sought anyone's pity, sometimes I did feel lonely back in Llanview...but thinking back now, I felt that loneliness most keenly when I was actually physically with people at a large gathering, especially at the country club or the Palace hotel.
Making small talk and forcing myself to smile at superficial acquaintances that I really felt no connection with has always been so difficult for me.
Being with a lot of people for too long and being compelled to carry on conversations about the weather, politics, what's in fashion and superficial discussions about television shows leave me absolutely drained...I often need to go home and be alone for days.
This is largely why I never stay long at large social gatherings.
It's probably a factor in why I often need to go on solitary walks in nature away from people, why I often eat out on my own and why I periodically go on retreats to either a cabin or ski resort on my own.
I've never felt that need that most others seem to have where they "need" a romantic partner or group of others at their side at all times.
Perhaps because I'm different from most people socially is why so many in Llanview felt threatened by me.
I know I often come across as aloof and cold because I never "need" others in the way that most others seem to.
My social needs are different from most others in that when I do gather socially, I do a lot better with just one other person or maybe a small group where we can delve deeply into meaningful conversations, especially about important things like human feelings, where the world is going, excellent books and art, historical events, psychology, medical advances, possibilities out in the universe.
As I arrive back in Washington, driving through an area of Mount Rainier, I smile to see holiday lights light up a small shopping area in the sunset.
Arriving home, I draw a bath, make another tea for myself, light a few bathroom candles, relax in the tub and just have a good feeling about the upcoming holidays as I plan to take my family to see the National Christmas Tree and maybe a couple of the Smithsonian museums.