Laura
Laura sat sipping her tea and watching both Lily’s friend, Fazire, and her husband, Victor, silently squaring off.
And in doing so, she worried.
This strange Fazire, surprisingly, didn’t seem frightened of Victor. He hadn’t even seemed frightened of Nate and nearly everyone was frightened of Nate. Her son was that kind of man, dynamic, magnetic, tall, powerfully built. You took one look at him and you knew, no matter what, you should not mess with him.
Victor was older, softer but still held a certain menace that only Laura and, eight years ago, Lily, could see through.
Unfortunately, it appeared Fazire could see through it too.
Victor obviously didn’t like that. He’d put a great deal of effort into honing his legendary menace.
“They’re taking a long time. Tash-child, go see what they’re doing,” Fazire ordered, his arms still crossed on his chest, his head still tilted back ludicrously to stare at them down his sloped nose as if he was used to a greater height.
“Let them be. They’ve things to discuss,” Victor contradicted as Natasha began to do what she was asked. The child glanced at Victor and then settled back in the couch again and turned to Laura.
“There’s lots of photo albums, lots and lots. Fazire likes to take pictures,” Natasha explained her child’s idea of what was taking her parents so long.
Laura silently hoped there were hundreds of albums.
Thousands.
“I can’t wait to see the pictures, my darling,” Laura smiled at her granddaughter then, as she had been wanting to do since she saw her, she touched the soft skin of her cheek. “Do you know how lovely you are?” she asked, mainly because she couldn’t help it.
The child’s response startled and delighted her.
Natasha nodded happily. “Oh yes, Mummy calls me the most beautiful girl in the whole world.” She giggled to herself at this idea, as if it was funny, as if it was not the absolute truth.
Laura thought that she was the most beautiful child she’d ever seen. Who would have thought Nathaniel’s intensely masculine features in feminine, child-like form could be so striking.
“Tash,” Fazire called warningly and dropped his chin to stare down at her in a practised way that expected obedience.
“Oh, all right,” Natasha gave in, sounding mock-disgruntled and she scooted to the end of the couch, found her feet and skipped out the door.
The minute she was out of sight on the stairwell, Victor pounced.
“They need time together,” he snapped at Fazire.
Fazire turned to face Victor and shook his head slowly. “They do not.” Each word was said with absolute certainty.
“There are things Nathaniel needs to explain.” Victor was leaning forward at the waist, trying to hold his temper.
One look at her husband and Laura said soothingly, “Victor.”
Laura knew that this Fazire meant a great deal to Lily. Laura had heard Lily talking about him, she told Laura stories about him. He was far younger than Laura would have guessed, considering he was with Lily’s family before she was born and he looked to be in his forties.
It simply would not do to have Victor go head-to-head with him in Lily’s living room on this, their first, most delicate visit with her.
Fazire, still not seeing any of Victor’s notorious menace, retorted, “Then he should explain them to me. I was the one who stood outside your door when your daughter told Lily he was dead. I was the one who stood looking into the devastated eyes of a twenty-two year old pregnant girl who was all alone in the world except for me. I was the one who called the ambulance when the blood was pouring out of her and she nearly lost Natasha. I have been at her side all these years, while he lived two hours away and didn’t bother to travel the distance to knock on the front door.”
Victor’s face was turning an alarming shade of red and Laura stood to put a restraining hand on her husband’s arm. Every word the man said pounded into them both like sledgehammers.
Fazire wasn’t finished. “And I was the one who she came to after she’d gone to your home days ago, intent on finally telling you about Natasha, which she’d been talking about doing since Tash was born. She’d even felt guilty about it, not going to you, even though she’s had barely two pounds to rub together for eight years. I was the one who saw the state she was in when she returned and I was the first one to see the bruises you gave her.”
The red in Victor’s cheeks was now there for another purpose.
“We thought she’d –” Victor began.
“It doesn’t matter what you thought,” Fazire cut him off. “Anyone who spends an hour in Lily’s company knows she’s worth a trek up the side of a treacherous, threatening volcano to get her back, much less a two hour automobile ride.”
Finally, having had his say, Fazire turned away and dismissed them, sipping daintily from his teacup. He idly watched as Mrs. Gunderson sauntered in the room, took one look at him, blinked as if communicating to him that his short, effective tirade was well-stated then sauntered out again.
Laura decided to play mediator. “We have to all get along, for Nathaniel and Lily’s sake. For Natasha’s sake.”
Fazire’s gaze slid to her. “There is no ‘Nathaniel and Lily’. Lily won’t have it. Lily is through with your son. And, unfortunately, I can assure you that the Lily you knew all those years ago is not the Lily of today. When the Lily of today won’t have something, it simply isn’t to be had.”
Laura felt a sinking feeling in her stomach and her dismayed eyes flew to her husband but he was looking at Fazire and Laura saw that Victor was smiling.
“What you don’t know, Fazire,” Victor proclaimed, “is when my son wants something, he finds a way to get it.”
Fazire squared off again with Victor.“We shall see.”
At that, there was a great clamour from the stairwell and Natasha came down, grinning from ear-to-ear and carrying a photo album. She ran into the room and slapped it down on the table in front of Laura.
“Here’s the first one we should look at. It’s the most recent but it has the best pictures, eh… ver,” She announced.
Lily and Nathaniel followed more slowly, both carrying albums of their own. Lily walked into the room with her cheeks flushed becomingly, making her look more healthy and alive than they’d seen her in these recent days. However, her eyes were wary.
Nathaniel, on the other hand, walked in looking very pleased about something.
Laura glanced at her husband and that sinking feeling lightened wonderfully.
Before anyone could say anything, another great racket came from the hall.
“I’m late, I’m late.” They heard before they saw the body behind the voice. “I know I’m late. Tesco was a crush. The Witches Dozen was a madhouse. I barely…”
Then the door was filled with a large, very pretty, older lady who looked somewhat like Elizabeth Taylor. She was wearing a long, amethyst-coloured caftan liberally threaded with silver. She accented this with lots of silver jewellery that jangled noisily and very high-heeled purple mules with pointed toes, festooned with sequins. She was carrying a baker’s box and four, dangling carrier bags from Tesco.
She stopped dead at what she saw. First Natasha kneeling on the floor, opening an album. Then her eyes shifted to Laura. Then to Victor standing beside Laura. Then to Fazire scowling ferociously. Then to the blushing Lily.