A Seal Upon Your Heart (42 page)

“But I did it anyway!” She looked at her sharply. “I told him that he was too scared to face his colleagues and family with a black wife! I told him and guess what? He made no attempt to correct the ‘mistake’.”

Martier bit her lip.

“It’s okay, Martier, because it finally dawned on me that all this time I’ve been waiting for him to come to me. I haven’t been living, I’ve just been waiting.” Claudette finally smiled and there was something in her smile that caused Martier to nod. She understood. She leaned forward and hugged Claudette.

“I’m going to miss you. You have no idea…” She didn’t want to lose someone that she cared about right now when she was in the midst of reliving the biggest loss of her existence. But that wasn’t Claudette’s burden. She smiled at her friend.

“I’m going to miss you too. You are…the daughter I wish I could have had.” Martier choked on a sob and looked down and nodded quickly.

“Thank you.” She managed. “You’re the mother I wish I had.” Claudette placed her palms on the younger woman’s face and looked at her earnestly.

“You take care of yourself. You come first, do you understand?”

Martier blinked away her tears. “Yes. I understand.” Claudette kissed her and Martier went back to work. She told Claudette that she’d bring her personal effects from the office just so that she would have another opportunity to visit her before she disappeared from her life. Although the two friends had made promises to keep in touch, Martier knew that realistically it probably wouldn’t happen. She knew just from the convent that close friends were made but once those friends left, then the friendships ended because out of sight meant out of mind.

~***~

After finishing up with some things in his office, Tim knocked on Aaron’s door.

“I’m busy!”

He opened the door and came inside anyway and Aaron glared at him.

“Where’s Claudette?”

Aaron began to sputter. “I’m getting someone to fill in for her.”

“I heard she quit.”

Aaron’s mouth opened and then snapped closed. “She’ll be back. She just needed a little time. What do you want Singleton?”

Tim closed the door behind him and sat down in the chair opposite the older man. Aaron was tall and thin and while not quite handsome, he possessed a quality that appealed to people. His hair was silver and his face was clean shaven. He normally carried himself with an air of quiet confidence. But today he seemed anything but quiet and confident. Even his suit was rumpled as if he’d slept in it.

“Claudette is the sweetest woman in the world. And she’s devoted to you. What did you do to her?”

Aaron began typing something on his computer. “Mind your own business, Singleton.”

“Did you cheat on her?” Aaron snorted. “Well what then?” Aaron didn’t speak. “It’s not as if there are millions of people that you can talk to about this. I’m one of…well I’m the only one. So what’s going on?”

Aaron sighed. “Claudette accused me of being ashamed of her. It’s completely ludicrous. Everyone knows about us, for god’s sake!”

Tim frowned. “Do you love her?”

“Of course I do!”

“Well, not everyone here loves the person their sleeping with.” He held up a hand before Aaron could sputter at him in anger again. “But I have no doubt that you love that woman…but she obviously does.” Aaron quieted and regarded Tim.

“We’re like…one in the same. It might be foolish to say but Claudette is my better half. She knows me like no other person ever could.” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I’m seventy-two years old, Tim. I’m not interested in getting married and…we have a comfortable life together just the way it is.”

“Aaron, it’s my experience that when a person says they don’t need something that their mate desires—then more than likely it’s something that they really don’t want but they aren’t willing to admit it.”

“That’s not the way it is,” he shook his head in denial. “I’ve ALWAYS been honest about my feelings concerning marriage—and it has nothing to do with Claudette’s race. I didn’t want children either…I see the world we live in and I wouldn’t want to bring any human being into this gutter!”

“I’m too old for children, I can’t imagine myself with little ones,” Tim said. “And I’ve already been married and know that it doesn’t reinforce your feelings for the one you’re with. Marriage is not something that I need to repeat.”

“So you understand?”

Tim looked at him grimly. “I understand that if you love her then you’ll do what it takes to make her happy.”

Aaron grunted.

~***~

Martier was placing Claudette’s personal items into a shopping bag that she had found in one of her desk drawers. When she heard Tim’s voice inside the office, she couldn’t help but to listen to their faint conversation.

“I’m too old for children, I can’t imagine myself with little ones, and I’ve already been married and know that it doesn’t reinforce your feelings for the one you’re with. Marriage is not something that I need to repeat.” 
Martier heard those words and they crushed her. He didn’t want to be married…

CHAPTER 36

“I think this is it!” Dhakiya said. Martier rolled her eyes discreetly. She’d heard the same thing at least once a week. She looked at the dress that her friend was holding up against her body and could have sworn that it was one that Dhakiya had already selected and rejected. She feigned interest and found the words to exclaim about everything she liked about the dress and to downplay any of Dhakiya’s concerns. And then she remembered why it had been rejected; the price tag.

Dhakiya was in the process of hanging it back up when Martier slipped it out of her hands.

“We are getting this dress.”

Dhakiya made a sad face. “We’re on a budget-”

“I’m buying you this dress.”

“No-”

“You said it was perfect for you and you only get married once-”

“Martier this dress is three thousand dollars; a dress that I’m only going to wear once? I can’t do that. I can find a dress I like for half that, I just have to look harder-”

“Listen to me,” she said firmly, “I have the money. Let me do this for you and we’ll consider it your wedding gift.” Dhakiya gave her an unsure look and seeing her hesitation Martier went in for the kill. “Now that we have something new we’ll just need something borrowed and something blue and we’re almost there.”

Dhakiya bit her lip and smiled and then pulled the dress out of Martier’s hands and hugged it. “Eee!” She squealed. She pulled Martier into a hug. “Oh thank you, sis!” Martier smiled as much for the fact that the wedding dress shopping was finally coming to an end as she did at her best friend’s happiness.

“When you get married, sis, I’m going to make sure it’s everything you want! Just think, pretty soon we’re going to be two married women and we have to have kids right away! I want our kids to be the same age so that they will be best friends. We’ll synchronize our pregnancy watches!”

The smile fell from Martier’s lips and she turned away.

“What’s the matter, honey?”

“I…” she forced a smile and squeezed her friend’s hand, “nothing.”

Dhakiya stared at her. “Martier, what’s wrong,
inkumi
?”

Martier swallowed. “I’m not going to be getting married.” Something felt so hollow and definite at putting those words out there in the universe.

Dhakiya draped the dress over a rack and placed her hands on the younger girl’s shoulders. “Did something happen? You and Tim didn’t break up did you?”

“No, it’s just that Tim doesn’t want to get married.”

Dhakiya didn’t respond for a moment and then she went, hmph. “Well he can’t have the milk without the cow.” She said a few choice words in her native tongue and then flashed Martier a firm look. “You are going to have to lay down the law, sis!”

Martier watched her intently. “A friend of mine said that if you have to tell a man what you need and then he gives it to you it doesn’t mean as much. I don’t want to tell Tim that I want to be married, I want Tim to tell me that he wants to be married to me.” Her throat began to ache as the emotion rose in her. “It’s like…I feel stuck. I love Tim and he’s all I want and I think that I’m all he wants. Can that be enough?”

“Hell no. Because you’re a Christian, sister. You told me that you gave yourself to Tim because he was already your husband in your mind. You haven’t fulfilled that contract. And you want to have children—”

“Tim…” Martier’s voice cracked, “doesn’t really want to have kids, either.”

“Well hells bells! You need to dump this old white man!” Dhakiya said loudly and several women looked at them in surprise. Martier’s face grew warm.

“That’s not fair-”

“I knew that he was going to pull this! I knew it!! Let’s get out of here.” She headed for the door.

“Well what about the dress?”

“Forget the dress!” Dhakiya bit out angrily.

Martier followed her friend out of the store with a sigh. She was on the verge of tears but fought them back. They climbed into Dhakiya’s car and her friend started the engine. “Tim is using you,” she said simply.

Martier rejected that and shook her head. “He loves me, I don’t doubt that.”

“I’m not saying he doesn’t love you.” Dhakiya pulled out of the parking lot and began driving. “But he has to know that you want more than to just keep his bed warm!”

“Oh Dhakiya! You don’t know enough about it to be so judgmental! So he doesn’t want to get married. He wouldn’t be the first man that doesn’t want to walk down the aisle.”

“Okay, but is it marriage he’s rejecting or commitment?” Dhakiya spared her a look. “Because isn’t that all marriage is?” Martier silently stared out of the window. Dhakiya’s voice softened. “I’m not trying to hurt you.”

“I know.” Martier whispered as tears pricked her eyes.

“Has he asked you to move in with him?” Martier didn’t answer. “Have you ever even slept in the big house with him? Does he talk about a future with you? Does he know that you want babies?”

Martier looked at her. “Stop. Okay? Please, just stop.” She looked out the window again and the two friends drove in silence.

~***~

Tim watched Martier with worry. When he’d come over this morning he saw that her eyes were red but she denied that she’d been crying. So much had happened in the last week; the return of her lost memories and subsequent refusal to speak to a therapist and then Claudette’s move to Alabama. Just last week they had embarked on a new phase of their relationship and it had been beautiful. But now it seemed that there was a wall between them that he didn’t know how to get around and it pained him. He wanted to find a way to help her cope or to at least talk to him about her feelings. Instead she kept them trapped inside.

He knew that it was well past time for him to tell her about what he’d learned about her father but he feared that hearing more bad news might just push her deeper into her funk. But it wasn’t his place to keep it from her so after dinner he brought out the file that he had collected on her father and placed it in her hands.

“What’s this?” She was preparing to put in a movie but stopped to open the manila folder.

“Martier I did some research on your family and I thought you might want to see what I found. I had gathered this information in hopes that it would help piece together some of your memories.”