Eleven West
Monday
“You sure you want me here for this, Dad?” Nicole said. “Seems it’s between you and Mom.”
“I want you here,” her mother said. “Whatever this is, you ought to hear it too.”
Her dad nodded. “I’m just sorry I never told you, Ginny. You told me about your previous relationships—”
“Which didn’t amount to much. So this was a relationship?”
“It was.”
“In Vietnam?”
“Yes.”
“Did you love her?”
“I thought I did. Well, yes, I did. And hard as it is even for me to believe, while it was deep and meaningful and special, especially at that time in my life, I can tell you honestly, even at its best it was nothing like what we have. I can’t deny we were in love, but I don’t want you to ever think it holds a candle to—”
“I’ve never doubted your love, Ben. It just gave me pause to find that picture and wonder. And to learn she was someone so special to you, and I have never heard of or about her.”
“That’s all on me. I regret it and I’m sorry. Sorry for not telling you. Sorry for hiding the box. Sorry for leaving it out where you could stumble onto it.”
“Did you sleep with her, Ben?”
“May I tell you the story from the beginning?”
Ginny nodded, and he told her everything, leaving nothing out. It was the first time Nicole had heard how he had been wounded.
“I never saw her, talked to her, heard from her, or wrote to her ever again. I didn’t want to see another death notice like Red’s, so I was relieved when my father told me that the proxy scholarship from the foundation had been used by Bian Nguyen at Saigon National Pedagogical University. All I know is that she graduated. I don’t know where or when or if she ever used her teaching degree or even whether she’s dead or alive.”
Nicole’s mother’s eyes were full. She reached for him and he took her hand. “She sounds like a wonderful woman. And so did Red. It sounds like Red helped you grow up too. Forgive me for doing the math in my head, but while Charm is our age, do you realize Red would have been nearly ninety by now? Those women helped make you the man you became, Ben, and I’m grateful for both of them.”
“But I was lost without you,” he said.
“Who knows how receptive you’d have been if you’d never met Charm? I’m curious enough to maybe look her up myself some day. She opened your mind, developed your heart.”
“It shouldn’t surprise me you’d be so good about this,” he said. “Forgive me?”
“Of course. But there had better be no more secrets.”
“Promise.”
That afternoon in the corridor at the hospital, Nicole called the doorman at her building and asked if he’d do her a favor.
“Anything,” Freddie said. “You know that.”
“When you get a minute, just see if I’ve had any packages arrive, anything too big for my mail slot.”
“I’ll check right now. Hang on …” She heard him entering, checking with the front desk. “Just one,” he said. “Thick, padded envelope from Saudi Arabia.”
“Freddie, could you have that messengered to me here at Sinai? Just tell them Eleven West and put it on my bill.”
“You betcha, Doc. And how’s Mom?”
“Better. Much better.”
“And did the cops find there was foul play?”
“I’ll you the whole story in a few days.”