Chapter 35
Ashford Mansion
Monday, April 18, 2011
10:31 a.m.
Sophia alighted from her new bulletproof black Mercedes and looked over the house Ethan had been raised in.
Occupying a grand corner plot with an enormous garden surrounding it, Ashford Mansion was among the finest and largest properties in Chiswick, with its elegant detached Grade II listed family house.
Ethan has described something completely different. “The garden needs tending,” she mumbled, eyeing the overgrown weeds and the leaves scattered everywhere. But then, his reference of it was of coldness and pain.
Zahira and her assistant followed Sophia as she inspected the house Ethan had grown up in.
She opened the front door and her steps echoed in the empty marble hall. They took all the furniture. Well, good riddance.
The hall opened into a grand reception room that lead to an indoor pool that resembled the Roman baths with large painted murals depicting couples in graphic and degrading sexual acts. Sophia gagged and stepped back. Oh, Ethan.
She looked at Zahira’s assistant and said, “Please, dear, get rid of this as soon as possible. Before even starting any other work. Tomorrow. I don’t care how. Splash them all over in white or black if you think it’s better. I don’t want anyone seeing these murals. I want this transformed into two pools, one for the babies and children and the other for the teenagers. It’s a good place for inside exercise. See if it can be enlarged to put a small work-out space.”
Sophia couldn’t hear Ethan’s childish giggles or imagine him there. It was a wasted and hollow place for indulgent and immoderate hedonism.
“What do you think, Zahira?” she asked after wandering through the house in a stunned and shocked silence.
“It’s a great property. It doesn’t need many changes except…a cleansing.” Zahira held Ethan in high regard and Sophia felt she was horrified too as her usual lively chatter diminished to just pointed remarks. “We can use the backyard building as a daycare house. It’s big enough for twenty or even thirty babies and maybe thirty toddlers. Whenever the weather is good we can take them for outside play and exercise on that beautiful, center garden. On the main house, we can have the older ones as they need more attention. Sophia, this property is so big that it can house many children and provide them with all the physical and psychological assistance they need and bridge their way to adopted families.”
“I’m sure you’ll be able to secure permission for further extension work to create a basement space for indoor sports activities and office space above the garages.” She locked the door and breathed in deeply, relieved to be out of the house. “Zahira, I want you personally in charge of this.”
“Don’t worry, Sophia.” Zahira looked around as they walked to the car. “I can already see children coming back to life in these superb gardens. We will need very few modifications.”
“I want the refurbishment started as soon as possible. I want this to be a happy haven for children in need. And, Zahira, I don’t want this to be called Sophia Leibowitz Foundation House.” She shook her head pensively, stopping and looking back at the house. “I want a discreet gold matte plaque, praising Ethan, something simple…”
“Ashford Mansion for Children?” Zahira turned also. “Sounds a bit pompous.”
No, never. She tilted her head to the side as a name rolled in her mind. “Over the entrance and on a small plaque by the door, it will say: ‘Ethan Ashford Refuge for Children.’ I will commission a white marble bust of Ethan to be put beside the main door, with an engraving: ‘He made a difference.’”
Ells Hall
Friday, April 22, 2011
8:21 a.m.
Tickles woke up Sophia. Very slowly she raised the coverlet and stole a peek under it to discover Alistair, lying on his side, facing her slightly round belly, his nose almost touching it while he whispered and chuckled. He was so engrossed in what he was doing that he didn’t even notice that she was awake and watching him with an endeared smile on her face.
“’Morning, Handsome,” she whispered.
“Hey. Good morning. Sleep well?” He smiled up at her, delighted as a child playing with his favorite toy. “I was having a very nice chat with this little warrior here. Man stuff, you know.”
So sweet, Husband. “No, I don’t. I’m a woman. I’ve always been fascinated with this man stuff. What is all that about?”
“Well, football, of course,” he chortled when Sophia scrunched her nose. He knew she hated soccer. “Then…hmm…cars, horses, food, money, and sex, and women. Not necessarily in that order.”
At her indignant gasp, he laughed out loud and threw the coverlet off them, pushing her on her back, ready to pounce.
Ah! “Apologize, Husband.” Sophia moved quickly and put her feet on his shoulders keeping him away. She tsked and said, “And restart your chat by teaching this little guy how to treat women with politeness and respect.”
With a naughty grin, he put a hand over his heart and said ironically, “Oh, my sincere apologies, my fair lady. I promise to raise our son like a gentleman. I’ll teach him to press his own shirts and to sew his own buttons. He will not be allowed to watch porn and will marry a virgin—”
Sophia laughed and pulled him down, pressing her legs on his shoulders. “Hmm, Lord Chauvinist, we’ll have to rethink these ideas of yours.”
“Maybe another time.” He lowered his head to kiss her. Looking at her from beneath his long black eyelashes, he said mischievously, “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have pressing business that needs to be taken care of.”
“Be my guest,” Sophia breathed huskily, already hot for her husband’s caresses.
Their faces were a whisper apart making the world fall out of focus around them.
His forest-green eyes searched hers and he saw himself mirrored in her yellow-diamond ones, amazed as he felt her soul linking to his. He could tell they had become one.
When their love-making was over and Alistair tried to roll over, her arms tightened around him and she whispered, “Stay. I like your weight over me.”
He raised his head to look at her as he heard a strange tone in her voice.
“I love you so much, so much, Alistair Connor, that sometimes it hurts.” Sophia’s eyes were clear with joy. “A good hurt.”
“Good,” he said seriously, kissing her eyelids, “because otherwise this Alistair Connor would have to kill himself.”
That made her smile. “Then I’d have to poison myself.”
“I never liked the story of Romeo and Juliet. It seemed stupid,” he grunted and kissed the tip of her nose, rolling over and taking her with him.
She propped herself up on his chest. For a few minutes, she only watched his face and traced it with the tip of her fingers. Then she sighed and said, “We have to start living again. I want to go back to teaching after Easter.”
Fuck, Sophia. Already? His hand moved to her head, but it landed gently on her back. Her hair had begun to grow in a few places and there was a smooth shadow coating her scalp. The skin was recovered nicely too but she was still annoyed by her appearance. He raised an eyebrow. “Do you want to go back to Atwood House?”
“Not yet.” She stared at him and shrugged. “I’d like to live…away for a while. Here. Or in Scotland.”
He almost choked. “Here or in Scotland? Are you serious?”
“Yes and no, Lord Urban,” she smiled at his shock. “Here at Ells Hall, or Airgead, or somewhere else peaceful, from Friday, after Gabriela’s school, to Monday morning and…” Somewhere in London but not Atwood House. At least, for now.
Sophia didn’t remember much of what happened inside Atwood House, but her memories of the time during the dungeon were still with her. The terrible images came during the day. They came during the night. She could be lying in bed, thinking about her thesis or how she wanted to furbish the baby’s room and she would be transported back to that dark hell, her wrists and an
kles bound. She could be in the shower and all of a sudden, instead of clear water she would see blood, dirt, and no amount of scrubbing would make her feel clean.
He had noticed that she spaced out, sometimes in the middle of a conversation, her eyes glazing, her hand gripping his so hard it hurt. And although she had healed physically, he was quite sure it would still take a time before she could find the courage to return to Atwood House. But she had never told him to sell it, only that she didn’t want to go back yet. “You don’t really want to sell Atwood House, do you?”
“Well. No, I don’t. I want to redo the TV room and the office and improve security. I talked with Carol about this before she left and she promised to send me her ideas. Valentina has already sent hers. And Liang is working on the security. I never rented my apartment on Eaton Square. We could live there until Atwood House is ready. If that’s okay with you.”
“Of course it’s okay with me.” Alistair’s hatred for what Uó, Alberto, and Emma had done to her had not lessened after the trial and their life sentences in prison. The only thing that made it better was Sophia’s smiles. Maybe only when all the shadows in her eyes were gone, he could accept it better. Until then, he would do anything and everything to ensure she found her happiness again. His broad hand ran over the smooth skin of her back, leisurely, the touch light and hypnotizing, trying to remove from her all the darkness that was still stuck inside. “And what else?”
She tilted her head to the side as if pondering his question and yet using the moment to gather her courage and fight off her tears. “Would you think me crazy if I told you that I’m quitting?”
“Quitting?” The rising panic in her voice made him croak the word. But it was in a smooth, light tone that he said, “You’re no’ a quitter. What are you planning on quitting?”
“My PhD and my position as the head of LO legal department,” she whispered, and looked down as if ashamed. “I’m going to finish teaching my classes, but my dissertation…it’s not so important anymore, the title, I mean. I’ll publish what I’ve done so far and present it with the Cambridge Socio-Legal Group, if they accept me. Then I want to dedicate myself to my family and to my work at the Foundation. Am I crazy?”
Alistair wasn’t expecting that answer and for a long moment, he stayed quiet, thinking about what he should say. Whether he should support her decision, or whether he should encourage her to pursue her dreams until the end, showing her that this was only a bad moment that was going to pass.
She raised her eyelids to search for a clue on his face but there was only astonishment imprinted there.
“Why?” he asked. “You are almost done.” You can ask for a break.
“Sometimes you don’t even realize anything is wrong until something happens and makes you see you deserve better, makes you want more.”
Her crestfallen look made his heart shrink in his chest. “And what more do you want?”
Less. “In the grand scheme, the little things that are so important become invisible phantoms when they should be an indispensable part of the complete picture. Inadvertently ignored, they choose a different path for themselves, walking away, struggling alone through the day. Quietly and sad, at night, they go to sleep without knowing if they’ll be opening their eyes the next morning.”
Oh, Christ. “Sophia,” he whispered, scared. “What are you saying?”
She laid her cheek on his chest and whispered, “When I was…alone, there, in the dark…I thought about all that I had missed and all I had achieved since I was a child. About my parents, my family, my childhood, my nonexistent teenage years, Gabriel, Gabriela, you, and this baby. I thought about what I did during all those years; how I rushed my life, running away from my own shadow, afraid of loving and being loved because it hurt too much to lose those you loved. I understood that not loving and not being loved hurt so much more. I weighed the true happy moments of my life and they always involved persons and relationships, never money. I thought about…if I were going to die. There was nothing significant to be written in my…epitaph…”
He tried to shoo away the sadness that had crept into the room. “You’re not going to die anytime soon. Tomorrow you’ll be twenty-seven, and there are so many great things you’ve done at such a young age, my love.”
And that is the problem. “I don’t believe in coincidences, Alistair Connor. There is an obvious presence of motivation in the way life…or God, if you wish, brings things into our lives. Sometimes, I have difficulty in defining its true nature. I guess on my grave, it would be written: ‘Here lies a young PhD that spoke six languages and spent her years studying and working.’ Or ‘Here lies a great philanthropist’. They all sound to me like: ‘Here lies a poor rich woman.’” She chewed her lip trying to contain her dismay inside. But she babbled the next words, “I wanted something silly and warm, like, ‘Here lies a beloved wife and gentle mother that will be missed.’ Something significantly normal. Something everyone had and I could have had too, but I was so afraid that I had snubbed it. And I decided then and there, that if I survived that…nightmare, I would want nothing more. Or better, I would want something more. I want to continue with my work at the Foundation but…can you understand what I am trying to say?”
“Aye, mo gràdh, I can.” He swallowed his own melancholia and said firmly, “You’re no’ quitting, Sophia. You’re redirecting your efforts to other places. Suffice to admit that you long to savor the flavor of different slices of life. Don’t make this such a big thing. Everyone will understand if you choose to drop some of your responsibilities. Momentarily. Or forever. Just one. Or everything.”
I didn’t look at it from this angle. “I’ll continue working as a lawyer, but only on the Foundation.”
“It’s already a big commitment, Beauty.”
“Alistair Connor,” she sighed and dipped her hands in his hair. “I don’t want to be a fake and I don’t want to be perfect. But I can’t be this huge flaw.”
Oh, my sweetheart. You have never been a fake or a flaw. And in the end, all of us are hiding something or pretending to be something that we aren’t to protect ourselves. He cupped her face in his hands and looked deep into her begging eyes. “Sophia, give yourself time. You have been through too much. You’re perfect just the way you are, with your qualities and defects. This is what I love in you. This is what each and every one who loves you, respects in you. You need a break? All you have to do, Sophia, is say it. Life is such an ephemeral yet strong happening, that we have to approach it with zero expectation and whatever it gives us in exchange for our time here, we have to make out of it our happily ever after, because death, its partner in crime, will someday come to collect her share. You know you have an army by your side to command. I’ll help you in whatever you want, all right?”
She nodded.
“All right?” he asked again, demanding to hear her answer out loud.
Bobbing her head, she breathed, “Yes.”
“Good. Don’t worry about this anymore. Talk with Leo tomorrow and I’m sure he’ll help you settle everything in Cambridge. I want to see you smiling. It’s your birthday and Easter. It’s a time for happiness, rebirth, and renewing.”
“Thank you, meu amor,” she breathed on his lips. “I must be an annoying wife, complaining all the time.”
“You don’t have to thank me. And you’re never annoying. Period.” He searched his mind for a subject that would distract her. A smile opened on his face when he asked, “Are fathers welcome in the delivery room?”
“Yes,” she smiled back at him. “If you don’t faint at the smell of charred meat and blood, you are more than welcome. In fact, I’d love you to be there.”
What the fuck? Alistair’s eyes widened. “Charred meat?”
She rolled on her back, showing him a very faint scar he had never noticed. “Gabriela’s cesarean. I still remember the smell when they started cutting me—”
“I don’t want to see you being cut,” he shook his head, propping hi
mself on his forearm, his finger tracing the scar. “Why don’t you go for a normal birth?”
“Because I don’t want to go through what happened with Gabriela again. Hours—whole day—in a gnarling pain to hear that I was weak and squeamish. I went to the hospital twice, but my ob-gyn wouldn’t admit me because I had no dilatation, in spite of the painful contractions. On the second time, Gabriel paid for a suite and called a friend of ours. Shocked, he rushed me into an emergency caesarean. I’d be one of those mothers who would die giving birth in past centuries. I had a lot of expectations about having not just a normal birth, but maybe even a natural one. There’s a lot of literature and pressure about how it’s up to the mother to have a natural birth. You’re a failure if you’re given pain relief or if you didn’t have this wonderful natural birth at home,” she said sarcastically. “Gabriela and I needed medical intervention for the sake of our health. Women shouldn’t come out of their birth experience feeling traumatized or violated. What makes me mad is the hypocrisy and the conspiracy of silence between women, even female doctors, not to tell about the experience so the mothers can’t change their minds before it. Natural birth can only be a wonderful experience if it’s healthily experienced.”
“Did he kill him?” he rasped.
Sophia looked at him, surprised, “Did who kill whom?”
“Did Gabriel kill your obstetrician?”
“Her, not him.” She smiled. “And yes, almost. But he was more worried about Gabriela and me.”
He was looking at her seriously, his eyes worried. “What does John think of this?”
“Oh, John is open-minded, and knows that often you don’t have any control and that it’s important not to feel that it has anything to do with you, ultimately. This will be a dream birth, only it won’t be a normal or natural birth. Besides, my body is my body, end of story.”