Cristiane Serruya - Trust - Betrayed

I don’t shout. “When have you heard me shouting?”

“Oh! When Mama was playing ball with us,” Gabriela affirmed.

Sophia giggled.

“Ah!” was the only thing he could answer. How can this small little girl render me speechless so easily?

“Kiss again?”

“Ah-ah,” Sophia shook her head. “Let’s save the kiss for the wedding tomorrow, shall we?”

“Oh! Yes, the wedding.” Gabriela cocked her head to the side and looked from one to another, biting her lip. She furrowed her delicate blonde eyebrows in thought. Clearly, there was something that she wanted to say.

Alistair searched Sophia’s eyes for a clue but she lifted a shoulder, indicating she didn’t know what it was.

“So, Fairy, are you excited about tomorrow?”

Gabriela held out her chubby arms to him and he picked her up from Sophia’s lap.

“I am,” she said as she made a ponytail with the long ends of his hair. “Does it mean that...” she flicked her eyes in Sophia’s direction, “from tomorrow I can call you Daddy?”

What? Stillness came over Sophia. She could feel Alistair’s intense gaze on her.

Sophia wished to say no.

Sophia wished to say yes.

She looked at the two people she loved most in the world and didn’t know what she wished anymore.

“Mama?” Gabriela was eyeing her with a flicker of doubt in her eyes.

Oh, Gabriel. Help me. She closed her eyes for a moment and she could clearly see Gabriel’s impossibly happy smile the first day Gabriela had said ‘Pa-pa’.

“Gabriela,” Alistair put his warm hand over Sophia’s and squeezed reassuringly, “we can talk about this-”

“No.” Sophia drawing a steadying breath and opened her eyes. “No. Let’s talk about this now.” Be gentle, Sophia. She is a child, not an adult.

Oh, Christ. Please, say yes, Sophia. Without a word, Alistair put his arm over her shoulders and brought her closer to him.

Sophia prayed that the trembling she was feeling inside didn’t show. “My angel.” She is not asking to replace Gabriel. She just wants a living father who she can give her love. Sophia cleared her throat and started again. “My love, your father loved you very much. You were precious to him. His life, his heart. And I’m-” She stopped because the tears were threatening to fall and she didn’t want to cry in front of Gabriela. Sophia, remember: To love is to put your loved one’s happiness above everything else.

Gabriela’s eyes rounded and she nodded. Beneath Alistair’s hair, she crossed her fingers and waited for Sophia to finish answering her question, not knowing if the answer would be yes or no.

I see. Alistair’s heart broke in two. There will never be a child calling me Daddy. “What your mother wants to say, Gabriela, is that Gabriel was your father and-”

Sophia put her finger on Alistair’s lips. Love cannot be imprisoned, Sophia. Almost choking on her restrained tears, she whispered huskily, “Angel, your father and I, we’ll be very happy if you call Alistair Connor, Daddy.” By letting you love him openly, Gabriela, I’m keeping your love for Gabriel alive.

With a piercing happy scream, Gabriela hugged Alistair’s neck and then flung herself onto her mother’s lap, embracing her, “Thanks, Mama. Thanks.”

Gabriela’s joy was so great that she couldn’t contain it. She jumped down from Sophia’s lap and ran away to meet Ariadne, screaming the news out loud.

Alistair’s arm over Sophia’s shoulder tightened and he rested his forehead on hers. “Thank-” His throat locked and he closed his eyes as the inevitable tears flooded them. Oh, Christ!

Sophia felt the tremor that went through Alistair’s big body and she knew that he was as moved as her.

You can’t see how much you deserved to be loved, can you? She wrapped her arms around him and whispered, “Alistair Connor, you don’t have to thank me. What I did... It was so simple.”

Simple? He drew a deep breath and cleared his throat, struggling to steady his raging emotions. He raised his head and opened his eyes to look at her, rasping, “Simple?”

Her thumbs dried the tears that rimmed his eyes and wetted his long lashes. She softly smiled at him, whispering, “You know, Alistair Connor... love is not about oneself, but about the other. It’s not about receiving, but about giving. It’s not about keeping, but about freeing. Love is not love if not shared. All I did was say yes to a free given love that could not be kept selfishly imprisoned.”

As he watched her, a strange feeling unfurled. It was a sense of privilege and mute wonder, as though he’d witnessed one of those miracles of nature. Alistair had to close his eyes. It was such a bright light that it could only be felt. When he spoke, reverence could be heard in his voice. “Sometimes, Sophia, when I look at you... When I hear your words... I feel like I’ve discovered a shining sun, so dazzling that it can’t be true, but then I know it’s real because incessantly it warms and lights my soul with gentleness and love and I wonder,” he opened his eyes and framed her face in his long hands, “I wonder what I’ve done to deserve you.”

Simpler answer. You are you. Melting under the most soft and loving kiss Alistair had ever given her, Sophia vowed she would convince him that he was deserving.

As they followed the kids back to the house, Alistair noticed that Alexander and two of his friends had joined the group around Sophia’s twin sisters. “Seems they have gathered a court of fans.”

She turned her head to see the scene. “It’s always like that. They are young, beautiful... carefree... I don’t know... They have something magical.” Something I lost along the way.

When she looked back at his face, he was eyeing her intently.

You have no idea, do you? He shook his head.

He wished she knew her own beauty. Not the outer one. That she could see, even though a little distorted. He wished she could know how beautiful she was inside.

He wanted to scream to the world what a special gift she had given him and Gabriela just a few minutes ago. He promised he would spend the rest of his days - their days - showing her how much he treasured her. He framed her face in his large hands. “No one, Sophia, no one is more magical than you.”

She mimicked his gesture, cupping his face in her hands, and said, “Maybe it’s you who brings out the magic in me.”

He smiled a self-deprecating smile, but before he could say anything, she stood on her tiptoes and kissed him firmly on the lips . “Come on. Let’s save your friends from those crazy girls. Dinner will be served earlier today. I don’t want to look sleepy and tired tomorrow.”

“You are always perfect, Beauty. Especially in the mornings.” He put his arm on the shoulders of the most gentle and giving woman he had known in his whole life wondering what would he do without her.

Saturday, August 7 th, 2010.

9.15 a.m.

The sun was shyly shining outside and the temperature was just perfect. The balmy weather and the warm breeze guaranteed the most beautiful and agreeable of days.

Sophia finished her breakfast and walked to the bathroom remembering Alistair’s disappointed face when she pushed him out of the bedroom at nine o’clock.

A perfect day for a wedding. She had made it. Every small detail was in place. That devil of a stubborn man, he had proven himself right. Sophia grinned at her naked reflection in the bathroom mirror and stretched, arms over her head, closing her eyes. Today, I’m not going to worry about anything.