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Page 32.
Scene 12. Graceful Topography
 Later that night, Jack and Molly lay together in her master bedroom a few miles down the road. Roberta had stayed behind at Mark and Janet's to spend the night with Gail and Marcia, as she often did—poor kid, in need of siblings and more family than Molly alone could provide. Jack and Molly were alone in her smaller ranch home on a quarter acre.
Molly was taking her time—waiting for Jack, but not limiting herself. If there was to be a second marriage for her, she would take her time—lots of time—about it. Then again—was there time? Not if she wanted more children. She never mentioned the subject to Jack.
Jack and Molly lay loosely tangled together amid jumbled bed sheets. Gentle night wind, smelling alternately of eucalyptus and jasmine, ruffled the long drapes and played over their unclothed bodies. It was the bedroom where Molly had slept with her husband, Tim Grace, before he was killed in an ambush six years earlier. He'd been on that black mission gone bad from start to finish that every agent dreaded. Everyone on his bench had been lost in a pre-dawn fire fight in a small Congo village named Tomo, in the DRC.
Of all the people in Southern California, none had followed the irony of the evening's dinner talk more knowingly than Molly, a secret agent's widow. Jack had never met Tim, but knew of him. Tim had worked for a rival Belgrade company, Sekuritate Mondo, which some years back had been directly acquired by Sigma 2020.
Molly had come into Jack's life through Janet, who met Molly Grace at a women's club. Molly was then newly bereaved and alone in the world with a young daughter to raise. Jack met Molly again a few years later over dinner at the Navy Officers' club in San Diego, when Molly and Janet were in the city for shopping, and Jack was on layover between Tokyo and Paris. From then on, it was a love affair like cappuccino chiaro (light) coffee—lots of hot, dark action on the bottom, topped off by a cloud of unspoken foam and feelings.
There was always this silent calligraphy, of thoughts and gestures, in the air between Molly and Jack. That they felt deeply drawn to one another was clear to each. They'd talked about this oftentimes. Tonight was no exception, as the wind whispered in the drapes, and the air smelled of the pool outside. The breeze brought scents of citrus, of sweet night-blooming jasmin in the wrought-iron fences, and of eucalyptus bark.
Fragments of old conversations lingered in the air. They had talked it all out, and nothing had changed—not their love, nor their frustrations.
"Do you feel anywhere near ready to settle down yet, love?"
He shook his head. "I want to, Moll. I don't know if I can. That's the awful part."
"I know, baby," she said. "I'm the only person within miles of here who understands. I was married to a wonderful man like you, who never came back. He'd come home all worn out sometimes, with bruises and bullet holes, and I'd patch him up. And he kept going out there. He'd kill someone, and he'd come close to being killed. He stared death in the face every time, and screamed at night when he came home to me. Now it's deathly still around me."
"Catherine appeared to me in a lounge at JFK."
"Oh my God." Molly buried her face in her hands.
Jack put his arm around her, to soothe her.
She would not be soothed. "I couldn’t bear to lose you, Jack. I’d risk everything to have you. I just can’t put Roberta through it again."
"I don't want to lay that on anyone, Moll. I love you so much."
"But we found each other, Jack. Isn't that enough?"
"It's all a man could ask. One day we'll dare again."
"I love you, Jack."
"And I love you, Molly."
"I go on with life, every day, raising Roberta, talking with Janet. I meet men, but none of them is right for me. It's just—it gets lonely here at night."
He pressed his face into her bosom. "I know." He sighed so deeply it was a sob. She held his head in her arms. She stroked his forehead and whispered endearments. "Baby, you can't change the past. Quit while you still can. Leave sleeping ghosts lie."
"They're at peace," Jack agreed. "But I am not yet." He'd run on the knife's edge too long, killing and waiting to be killed. He wasn't sure he could ever come home again.
"I'm ready to be ready if you are," Molly said. "I just can't promise to wait forever, Jack."
He ran his hand gently across the tender slopes and valleys of her body. "I know, darling, I know," he whispered, nuzzling her shoulder blades from behind. He held Molly, while she curled up in his arms. With his chin on her shoulder blade, and their bodies joined at the hips, the world was at peace. They listened to one another’s breathing. The gates of war were closed. They gradually fell asleep together.
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Copyright © 2018 by Jean-Thomas Cullen, Clocktower Books. All Rights Reserved.
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