Page 51 of Finding Parker

“I’d be honored,” Downes nodded his head toward Kenton then turned my direction, “I couldn’t be more pleased, Mr. Bale.”

“Thank you,” I smiled.

As Downes walked from the room to retrieve the car, Kenton continued to nervously pace back and forth across the floor.

“Have you decided when and where you’ll propose?” he asked.

I smiled and nodded my head eagerly.

“I have an idea and I think it just might be perfect…”

“Do tell,” he said, his voice filled with excitement.

“You’ll find out soon enough,” I smiled.

And soon enough he would.

VICTORIA. As a child, I couldn’t compare myself to other girls, because I wasn’t like other girls. From the time I was a young, I always stood out as being different – stronger, unafraid, faster, taller, more able, and unwilling to accept the phrase I am a girl as an ending to any type of sentence that started with I can’t because.

I have never been afraid of the dark, had any fears or suffered from any phobias that I can recall. Clowns, spiders, snakes, and bugs have never caused me to scream and run the other direction. Many times I’ve seen girls or women scream toward the closest available male well, do something with it! when they encountered a bug, spider or snake. I never had the luxury of being able to ask someone to do something with a bug or spider.

I’m sure I had one as a child and simply can’t remember, but I have no actual recollection of ever having a nightmare or bad dream. My nights in bed have always been filled with somewhat peaceful thoughts of tomorrow, and what might be required of me to get through it without fault or failure. If for some reason I failed, I knew the only person I could blame was me. As a result, I was not only my worst critic, I was my only critic.

And critical of myself I became.

Now, as an adult, I am confident I am as strong of a woman as could ever exist. If it can be done, I can do it. If anyone is able to endure it, I am able to endure it. No other woman is more capable than I, this I know to be true.

I now lay in bed using every ounce of courage I possess to assist in my becoming stoic.

Until tomorrow.

Tonight, as the silence pressed into my chest like a heavy weight, I found it more difficult to continue to breathe. A lifetime of a blaring television I once viewed as an annoyance I would now welcome as if it were the softest music to my ears. The screams of Victoria I need more pills, I’m in pain which caused me to roll my eyes in agony as I searched the streets for a black market substitute, I now yearn to hear.

I realize my mother is gone, and although I accept it as being just what it is, I am finding it troublesome to live with the change. A lifetime of repetition doesn’t necessarily make accepting change impossible, but without a doubt I have found it to be challenging.

My time away from Parker is time I have found increasingly difficult to live with. Being without him at my side is a simple reminder I have no desire to live my life alone. In some respects my mother’s departure from this earth freed me, and now I yearn to be captured.

Snatched from my life of silence and kept safe from any further changes for a lifetime of lifetimes.

I feel if I expressed my desire to spend all of my available time with Parker to Parker it would cause him to view me as weak and incapable. As a result, I lie in silence and wait for something to startle me from my current state of desire.

Anything.

One moment of unwelcomed silence is more disheartening than a lifetime of incessant screaming.

And the silence deafens me.

PARKER. We’d spent the entire trip to the jeweler discussing the intricacies of a diamond. I had received quite a lesson from Kenton regarding the four C’s of a diamond; cut, color, clarity, and carat weight. After his best effort to explain everything in detail, he insisted he do the all of speaking at the jewelers, to which I conceded. It was further agreed although he may do the negotiating, I’d certainly choose the diamond ring I personally preferred and felt I could afford.

Considering Kenton’s chattering like a chipmunk for the extent of the drive, it was apparent he was far more excited about my proposing to Victoria than I ever would have expected. In the short walk from the parking garage to the jeweler, Kenton’s pace was twice the speed of what Downes and I were walking.

“Christ, you two. Come on. We haven’t got all damned day,” he grinned as he all but skipped down the sidewalk.

As we rounded the corner and approached the entrance, Kenton burst through the doors as if he were walking into a saloon in an old western movie.

“I thought we’d go to Robbins Brothers. I don’t know that I have any business in here,” I gasped as we entered the Harold Stevens Jewelry Studio.

Kenton stopped walking and turned toward me, “Robbins Brothers? Does a true gentlemen take his wife to McDonald’s for a meal to celebrate their anniversary?”