I only hope it’s the first of many.
CHAPTER 7
Oh, the joys of a day off!
It’s still early when I awake to the familiar sounds of the restaurant downstairs. I make myself coffee and get back in bed. I roll under the covers and replay pieces of last night’s date over and over in my mind: when we talked about art, when he understood and took my hand across the table, when he kissed me in the elevator.
God, that kiss knocked me for a loop. Talk about hot. I mean, I don’t have a ton of experience, but I could barely walk after a ten-second kiss. Imagine what he can do with the rest of his body…
My phone pings. It’s him.
Apologies again for ending our date so abruptly. I had a great time and hope you did as well.
He had a great time! I feel like doing cartwheels, like I’m back in middle school.
Be cool, Grace, be cool.
I did, I text back. Paige would be proud.
It’s a beautiful sunny Sunday morning, a rarity for North Beach, so I throw back the covers and get out of bed. I’m feeling good, basking in the warm glow of this week. Even if things didn’t go exactly as I’d planned, I feel happy and hopeful about my new opportunities, Carringer’s and St. Clair too. After feeling trapped under a dark cloud for so long, it finally feels like there are blue skies ahead.
He texts again as I’m getting out of the shower. Looking forward to seeing you again.
“I want to see so much more of you next time, preferably out of your clothes” is not an appropriate response, so instead I write back, Can’t wait. I give up on removing the sappy grin from my face, and decide to use this positive energy for more good.
I get dressed and pack my sketchbook as well as some of the leftover dim sum from last night and take the bus up to the Legion of Honor Museum, one of my favorite places in the city. The bus takes a winding dirt road up a steep hill overlooking the San Francisco Bay and drops me off in front of the gorgeous museum building, done in the French neoclassic style. There’s a big white stone archway with intricate carvings, huge stone lion heads with majestic carved manes on the pillars as guards, columns ringing a courtyard with Rodin’s The Thinker poised atop a pedestal in the center.
The other tourists all head into the museum, but I wander through the archway that leads out back to the lawn. Here, the cliffs overlook the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge: one of the best views in the city. I stop as soon as I see the blue expanse of the ocean. It takes my breath away every time—and today is a rare treat, shimmering sunlight dancing on top of the cerulean water, sparking like fireworks under the massive orange bridge.
It was winter when I scattered mom’s ashes in this exact same spot. Mom didn’t want to be buried. She always said she didn’t want to be put in some grave in the middle of nowhere that I would feel obligated to visit, so she left instructions in her will to be cremated, and for me to scatter her ashes in a place I loved. I could almost hear the unspoken suggestion: someplace we both loved, somewhere we loved going together.
I deliberated for months after the cancer finally took her. It happened so fast, Mom didn’t even tell me about the diagnosis at first, she thought she’d have more time. I was already away at college on the East Coast, settling in to the demanding schedule and trying to keep up with my classes and my part time job. Mom didn’t want to ruin my college experience, so she kept quiet about it during our phone calls, delaying the inevitable as long as she could.
But she couldn’t put it off forever. Near the end of my freshman year, a neighbor called me and said Mom had collapsed while out grocery shopping, that she was too weak to keep taking care of herself alone. I was so confused. “What do you mean?” I asked.
“With the cancer, dear,” she said.
I couldn’t even say the word out loud. “She’s sick?”
I was on the next plane back to Oakland that same day. But the cancer was already advanced too far to treat. “There’s nothing the doctors can do,” Mom told me, looking so pale and weak, laying on the sofa. “There’s nothing you can do.”
But she was wrong. I could be with her for the time she had left, so she wouldn’t go through it alone. I came home, giving up my summer abroad in Italy. I did my best to care for her body and keep her spirits up. I would drive us up the Oakland hills to vista points so she could see the view from the car windows when she was too weak to walk, and take her on trips into the city for architecture tours. I fed her clam chowder in bread bowls at the pier, and listened to the bark of the piles of sea lions, let the sun warm our faces while the wind cooled our fingers. We sat for long stretches, just watching the world: the beauty, the art in the everyday movement of light on water, of birds in flight, of love on people’s faces – all the way to the end.
Now, I look out at the ocean, and know she’s somewhere there, a part of her at least, forming the beauty that we all enjoy every day. “I love you, Mom,” I whisper and blow a kiss to the air I like to imagine is still swirling her ashes along in beautiful faraway places.
I almost imagine I hear her say she loves me back. Even if it’s just a trick of the wind, it makes me smile.
“You’re it!” a kid behind me yells, pulling me out of my painful memories. Several more children run by, laughing and calling “not it!”
I’m reminded that the past is resting now; that it’s a beautiful day, and I can’t let a moment of it go to waste. So I head back inside to immerse myself in the gorgeous art, revisiting each room like old friends: the Monets and Cezannes, the mottled brushstrokes and bright vivid colors, the flowers and garden scenes like something out of a fairy tale, and of course, the sculpture garden. I have a seat under Rodin’s masterfully emotive sculptures, faces that look like real people. He manages to evoke the feelings in his subjects, the expressions frozen in place in a way that is only possible with the utmost attention to detail and skill with his hands.
I unpack my picnic, which thanks to St. Clair is a cut above my usual sandwiches. The leftovers from dinner are still moist and delicious, and as I eat, I find myself thinking about St. Clair again. He was thoughtful to have the wait staff wrap this food up for me, but that’s him to a T: always the gentleman, even texting today despite his busy lifestyle.
I can’t imagine what goes into running a massive successful corporation like he does. How can a person ever feel settled with his hectic schedule? Always traveling, hardly ever sleeping in his own bed, never able to just veg in his pajamas and watch TV or have dinner with a girl without getting called out for a work emergency.
I can still feel his lips on mine.
I wonder what he’s doing now, if he’s thinking of me. He’s probably handling some financial transaction worth millions of dollars, but I’m glad to have the opposite of that lifestyle right now: a free day with my sketchbook and yummy dim sum, salty ocean air and vista views, and art all around. What more could a girl ask for?
I lick some plum sauce off my fingers and pull out my pencils, and soon I’m busy shading and sketching the statues, the white stone columns of the Legion of Honor building, the iconic golden bridge above the shining blue bay. The world melts away, and for a moment at least, I’m totally at peace.
CHAPTER 8
Monday morning, I arrive at Carringer’s to find police cars parked out front, their red and blue lights still flashing. The huge doors are propped open and police officers are milling about on the front steps.
“You can’t go in,” one of them says as he blocks my path.
“I work here!” I protest, digging out a security badge. He studies it suspiciously, then finally stands aside and lets me pass.