Untraceable (11 page)

“
Hey, it’s
brother-in-law-step-father-uncle-grandpa
, remember? Goodnight.”

Micah and I were up early the next
morning. We offered to pick up Celeste and Giorgio, but they
insisted they would take a rental car to the house. I was getting a
little nervous that David and Mom weren’t up yet. Typically, when
David stayed over he would only stay in her room long enough to
make love and enjoy a little time together and then he would go to
a guest bedroom, but Micah informed me that when he checked David’s
room this morning it was empty. He was still in with Mom. I didn’t
have a problem with it, but what would his parents think about the
two of them coming out of the same room? I didn’t know if that was
the best way for them to find out they were getting a new
daughter-in-law.

Fortunately, about five minutes before
the car pulled into the driveway, they emerged. What was surprising
was that Kimmy was with them. Evidently, they had gotten up before
we did and invited her into their room and spent the last hour or
so discussing the new family that they would become in roughly six
months. Kimmy was smiling broadly as she looked at me and proudly
told me that David was going to become our dad very
soon.

I wanted to talk to her some more
about it, but apparently Mom and David had done a very good job of
making sure she was comfortable with the addition to our
family.

“
But it’s a secret,” she
said, putting a finger to her lips and making a shushing noise.
“We’re getting new grandparents, too, but they don’t know it,
yet.”

“
Oh, I have a feeling
they’re going to find out pretty soon.”

“
Yes, but we’re not
allowed to tell,” she giggled and then charged upstairs to get
dressed for church.

David appeared to be excited, but Mom
was clearly nervous.

Everyone went into the dining room
while Mom and I gathered the carafe of hot coffee and a tray of
Danishes for breakfast. Micah set out the coffee cups and dessert
plates on the buffet, while David made small talk with his parents.
By the time we were all ready to sit down and enjoy a bite to eat,
Kimmy had come downstairs. She was in a daisy patterned sundress
with her flat sandals, a hairbrush in one hand, a hair-tie on her
wrist, and a yellow hair ribbon in her other hand.

“
There’s my pretty girl,”
David said as she skipped into the room.

I noticed the look on Celeste’s face
as her eyes cut quickly from David to me. I don’t know why she
chose me to be the person who would explain David’s odd statement,
but I was keeping my mouth shut.

“
Can you tie this in my
hair?” she asked David.

“
I’ve never put a ribbon
in a girl’s hair before. Do you think I can handle it?”

She laughed, “It’s as easy as tying
your shoes, silly.”

“
All right, I’ll give it a
try. Dad, did you ever have to tie ribbons in Gwen’s
hair?”

Giorgio chuckled, “I left that in your
mother’s hands, but I’m guessing you can do the job.”

David fumbled and tied, untied and
retied. “Mom,” he finally said, “You may have to show me how to do
this.”

The whole thing seemed to fly right
over the top of Giorgio’s head, but Celeste was clearly confused as
to why David was even attempting to put a ribbon in my sister’s
hair. She rose from her place at the table and stepped behind
Kimmy.

“
Give me your brush and
ponytail holder, sweetheart,” she asked. She brushed the hair back,
wrapped the ponytail holder swiftly around the bundle of hair and
then slipped the yellow ribbon around the ponytail and made a large
bow. “There you go. Pretty as a picture.”

“
Thank you,” Kimmy said,
turning to hug Celeste’s waist.

Celeste returned the hug, but the
confused expression was getting deeper.

“
You’re going to be a good
grandma,” Kimmy stated and then took a seat next to David and
hugged him. “Were you paying attention?” she said with feigned
sternness. “I like wearing ribbons.”

“
Grandma Celeste was a
little fast, but I think I got the idea. We’ll see if I can do it
next time.”

“
I think someone has taken
a shine to you, son,” Giorgio laughed.

“
Well that’s a good thing,
Dad, because when I marry Nadia, Kimmy will be my daughter.” He
turned and looked at Kimmy, “Isn’t that right, kiddo?”

“
Yup.”

David reached over and
took my mother’s hand. Two pairs of eyes snapped to attention at
the gorgeous ring on her left finger. “Dad, Mom—I hope you don’t
have any plans for December 20
^th
because you’ve got another
wedding to attend.”

Celeste’s mouth was literally hanging
open.

Giorgio wrinkled his forehead as he
cleared his throat, “David, isn’t this going to make things a
little—awkward for Micah and Annalisa.”

“
It doesn’t bother me,”
Micah tossed out and then took a big bite of Danish.

“
It does make relations a
little hard to figure out,” I added, “but they are so deeply in
love that I think I can handle all the
brother-in-law-step-father-uncle-grandpa,
mother-sister-in-law-grandmother stuff.”

“
I’m sorry,” Mom spoke up.
“I know this probably wasn’t the best way to break this to you, but
David and I started falling in love the first time we met. He’s
been after me to marry him for six months, but it wasn’t until last
night that I realized neither one of us would be happy without the
other, so I said yes.”

“
This is why you’ve been
coming to Florida so much?” Giorgio asked.

“
Well, look at her. She’s
beautiful, and intelligent, kind and giving, and she has two very
special daughters—and, I’ve never felt this way about anyone in my
entire life. Don’t you two think it’s about time I settle
down?”

The silence was so long at the table
that Mom began to shrink in her chair. She had told me privately in
the kitchen that she was afraid they would look at her as a cradle
robber, though there was hardly that big of a difference in their
ages.

“
David,” Celeste finally
spoke, “are you honestly in love with—with Nadia?”

He reached across the table and took
his mother’s hand in his, “Mom, I’ve never been so absorbed into
another person in my whole existence. She means the world to me,
and it would mean the world to me to have you and Dad bless our
marriage.”

“
Nadia,” Celeste
continued. “This certainly changes things between us. I hope you
are sincere about how much you love my son.”

“
I am. Truly, I am. He’s a
wonderful man, but there was a reason I didn’t accept his offer
months ago.”

“
Nadia—it doesn’t—” David
began.

“
But they should know. I
had tubal ligation after Kimmy was born. I told David he should
marry someone who can give him a family of his own,
but—”

“
But,” David interrupted,
then paused, “that never would have happened anyway because I’m not
the type of guy to fall in love—it took a very special woman for
that.” He lifted Mom’s hand and kissed the back of it. “And you are
that special woman. I want to spend the rest of my life with you;
nothing else matters.” He finished his statement by turning her
chin toward him and softly kissing her lips. “I love
you.”

Their poor parents sat and watched the
transformation from David being an ice-cold, calculated,
never-had-a-tender-bone-in-his-body hitman to someone that
practically carved open his chest right in front of them so he
could expose his heart. They were speechless.

“
And you guys get to be my
grandparents,” Kimmy happily tossed out, ending the awkward moment
as everyone briefly laughed.

Giorgio pushed back his chair and
stood, and it was like an invisible command as David and Micah
followed, which brought Celeste, Mom, and I to our feet as well.
David took Mom’s hand and brought her around the table to where his
father was waiting.

“
I’m happy for you,
son—you have my blessing,” he stated, pulling him in for a
handshake, but getting a brief embrace from David
instead.

Celeste gave me a hug and quietly
asked if I had known what was going on all along, why did I ask if
David had ever been in love?

“
She is still my mother. I
needed to know if this was real. If you’d told me that he’d been in
love a few times, I would have been worried.”

By the look on her face, my answer
satisfied her. David glanced at us, but apparently hadn’t been able
to hear our exchange.

About thirty minutes before it was
time to leave the house for church, Micah asked me to come upstairs
with him. I wondered if David had asked him to pull me aside to
find out what his mother and I had been discussing, but when we
stepped into the quiet stillness of our bedroom, his request took
me by surprise.

He clasped my hands together, kissed
them, and looked at me with those beautiful eyes, “Will you pray
with me about the baptism?”

I went straight to my knees, taking
him with me. With our heads bowed, I began to give thanks to God
for bringing my husband to this point in his life. I knew that this
symbol didn’t mean that all our problems were behind us, but it
would mean that what was once behind us wouldn’t prevent us from
the life He offered before us. I prayed for a new kind of strength
for Micah, a strength that would help him see that he could keep
his promise to be a new creature. I prayed that he would never have
to take the life of another human soul and that God would give him
the strength and wisdom to find ways around what may, at some
point, seem impossible to avoid.

I wasn’t even sure where all the words
were coming from as they welled up from inside me. Micah was
speaking in soft whispers as I continued my feverish praying for
God to hold us in His hands, to keep us safe from what was coming,
to protect us when we are separated, to turn what is meant for evil
into good, to help us so that what can’t be trusted with our eyes
can be viewed through the heart of faith, to help Micah when I’m
not with him anymore.

The silence from Micah stopped my
prayers. I had been so deep into the moment that I didn’t know what
I’d been saying and it was the first time in my life that I knew
what people meant about the Spirit taking over when you don’t know
what to pray.

“
Baby?”

I slowly opened my eyes and quietly
looked up at him.

“
What’s
coming?”

I just stared, trying desperately to
remember what had been flowing from my lips before his silence
interrupted me.

“
Annalisa, you were saying
we’re going to be separated again. You…” His voice choked up. “Do
you even know what you were saying?”

I think he could tell by the look on
my face that I was just as surprised as he was about my prayer.
“I’m—I’m sorry, Micah. Something just took over and I’ve never… I’m
sorry, but no I don’t know what I was saying. Did I hurt you?” I
was thinking I may have uttered something that pierced his heart,
or ripped it out might be more appropriate by the look on his
face.

“
Hurt? No. Scared?
Yeah—it’s like you were telling me that something terrible is going
to happen and I’m going to need strength to get through it. Does
this normally happen when you pray?”

“
No. I started to say a
second ago that I’ve never had a feeling like this take over when I
pray. It may sound a little crazy, but I feel like I just woke up.
What was I saying?”

“
Maybe we should stay
home,” he said cautiously. “I think you may need to lie down for a
little while.”

“
No, Micah. I told you,
I’m sorry. I don’t know what just happened, but I know I’m okay
now. Please, don’t let anything stand between you and this baptism
today.”

He rose slowly, pulling me up to my
feet as he did. I didn’t want to tell him but I was incredibly
lightheaded.

“
Are you sure you’re going
to be okay?” he asked gently.

“
Yeah—let’s…” I glanced
down at my watch and realized that we’d prayed for thirty minutes.
Where had that time gone? It seemed that we’d only knelt down a few
moments ago. “We’d better get going.”

All the way to church, I felt horrible
for placing some kind of cloud over what was supposed to be a happy
event. But his concerned and perplexed expression began to
immediately lighten as we were welcomed into the church with open
arms. Pastor Anderson had been doing some major damage control
during the week and all those cold shoulders had melted into a warm
and happy reunion of sorts.

The service was beautiful and I could
tell by the end of it that Giorgio and Celeste were glad that they
decided to attend with us. Pastor Anderson stated that we were
having a baptism at the end, and if any of the church members would
like to join our family in witnessing the event they were welcomed
to stay. I was pleasantly surprised that no one got up to
leave.

Before they took Micah behind the
stage to prepare, I went up to sing my first song for him. I
reminded everyone that when God forgives us, those things are
separated as far from us as the east is from the west, and though
there may be times when we feel like we’re just one mistake away
from God abandoning us, He is always with us, always faithful to
forgive.