The Last of the Stanfields(86)
“Hey, don’t talk like that! We’re going to find your father. I promised, remember?”
“We’ll see. In the meantime, there’s still one person I can think of who knows more than he’s letting on. So, first thing tomorrow, we head back for round two with Professor Morrison.”
I looked straight at him. An old pickup truck parked on a forgettable Baltimore street is probably one of the world’s least romantic settings, and yet, right then and there, probably still reeling from my emotional roller-coaster ride, I decided to lean in and kiss George-Harrison.
It was a long, passionate kiss, the type that makes you forget where you are . . . unforgettable and full of tenderness. It didn’t seem like a first kiss at all, strangely enough. It was so familiar and natural, it felt like we had known each other forever.
At last, I pulled away, my cheeks flushed and red. “I don’t know what came over me,” I stammered. George-Harrison started the car without a word, and we drove on for a long while in silence, our hands clasped together.
32
ELEANOR-RIGBY
October 2016, Baltimore
By the end of that day, our kiss seemed like little more than a strange interlude, and George-Harrison was acting like nothing at all had happened between us. All through dinner, I was so quiet, it felt like he was carrying the entire conversation himself. When he finally ran out of other things to talk about, he told me a little about his mother. He seemed to have unending admiration for her. She had been a free spirit who never strayed from her own personal set of values.
“She was always taking on a new cause, the more desperate the better,” he said with a warm smile. “I admit, she went too far at times. When I started up carpentry, she forced me to put aside money to replant the trees that would have to be cut down and sacrificed for my livelihood. Which, of course, is total nonsense. Thinning out forests is essential to their preservation. But every time I explained that to her, out came the pamphlets on the sawmills ravaging the Amazon. Protecting the environment, standing up for children, fighting inequality, struggling against authoritarianism and bigotry, jumping to the front lines in the fight for freedom, and defending tolerance . . . she made all the rounds. But her biggest crusade was against corruption. She reserved a special kind of fury for people who lost touch with humanity in their thirst for power and money. I can’t count how many times I saw her totally lose it just reading the newspaper. I can even remember the last time, the final outburst before her mind started to go . . . ‘Children are slaughtered every day, living under threat of falling artillery shells, starvation, or exhaustion in sweatshops with unspeakable conditions . . . and yet people only run out to the streets to protest when two people who love each other happen to be of the same sex? Those goddamn hypocrites!’ Or, at least something like that. The injustice of double standards was another go-to cause for her. ‘Try not paying a parking ticket and they come take away your car, but the real criminals, the ones who get punch drunk and gorge themselves on the state coffers, who get paid to do nothing, who rig government contracts just to line their pockets . . . when they get caught? Oh, no! All they get is a slap on the wrist and they’re free to go. Nobody even cares.’ Sometimes I even ask myself if all the outrage is somehow to blame for her losing her mind so young.”
As interesting as the conversation was, it still felt like one of the longest nights of my life. I had hoped he would skip dessert, but no luck. I should have known better. I watched the waitress making the rounds, table to table, just wishing I could swap bodies with her. At last, I ducked off to the bathroom, just to buy some time away from him. When I came back, he had already settled the bill and was waiting by the door.
After walking back to the hotel, we stepped out of the elevator onto our floor, and George-Harrison turned to me. “I had a really nice evening, but it seems you didn’t. I’m sorry, I think I must have talked too much. See you tomorrow.”
And just like that, he left me in the middle of the corridor. I bristled, like a volcano about to erupt. I felt like I could sink right through the floor. I wanted to go pounding at his door, asking if he remembered the adventures his tongue had been on inside my mouth earlier in the day. At least now I knew where we stood, no doubt about it. Starting the next morning, I’d take on the same attitude and act like nothing at all had happened.
I tossed and turned in bed, going over and over the call with my father in my head. In the early hours of the morning, I had a nightmare. I found myself in the Stanfield manor, an exquisite and opulent space full of marble flooring, crystal chandeliers, and wooden walls adorned with gold leaf. I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror. I had on a maid’s uniform, with a striped, fitted-waist blouse and ruffled lace headband holding back my hair. I carried a heavy tray in my hands, so cumbersome that it made me walk unsteadily, as I entered the dining room.
Hanna and Robert Stanfield were seated at opposite sides of a comically long mahogany table brimming with ornate candlesticks and silver cutlery. A child version of my mother was nearby as well, seated with her back as straight as a broomstick. An old man sat across from her, smiling warmly at the young girl. I served the lady of the house, who told me my tray was tipping and warned that she would dock my pay if I spilled a drop on her Persian rug. With an authoritarian flick of the wrist, she ordered me to serve the others. As I worked my way down the table, the stately grandfather winked at me, but the child version of my mother put out her foot and tripped me. I went sprawling and fell straight down onto the rug, eliciting roars of laughter from the entire table.