A Winter Symphony: A Christmas Novella Read online

  “You think we woke Coco up?”

  “I felt a little wiggling in there.” Juliette placed her hand over his and moved it. “There. Feel it?”

  He did feel it, the little hand or foot pushing against the walls of the womb. Sometimes Juliette would balance a small cup of water on her belly and wait for the water to dance in the glass. She would say, Oh, no, the T-Rex is coming…

  “Does it hurt?” he asked.

  “Not really. Coco is a good roommate. Lots more dancing since we came here, though. I think Coco likes the French Quarter.”

  “Coco likes all the beignets you’ve been eating.”

  Juliette gasped dramatically. “Beignets? What a wonderful idea…” She rolled over to face him, a maneuver she liked to call a walrus pirouette. “That’s exactly what we should have after breakfast.”

  “After breakfast? What are we having for breakfast?”

  “Blueberry waffles, coush-coush, and omelets.”

  “That’s it?”

  She poked him in the center of his chest. “Extra powdered sugar on the beignets, remember.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  He dressed quickly. Before leaving, he paused in the kitchen doorway and watched Juliette cook. She was singing “Parlez-Moi d’Amour” to herself as she sliced onions and mushrooms, massaged olive oil into the flesh of bright red bell peppers. She’d bought a New Orleans-themed cookbook on their second day here, and every morning she tried a new recipe. In the two weeks they’d been here, Juliette had bloomed like a rose. He hadn’t realized how much the cold of Manhattan’s bitter winters bothered her until he watched her come alive under the January sun of New Orleans.

  “I have a present for you,” he said.

  She glanced at him, gave him that sly smile he always loved to see. “Another one?”

  “I saved the best for last. I’ll give it to you after breakfast.”

  “We’re taking the streetcar tour after breakfast.”

  “I’ll give it to you on the streetcar.”

  “Ah, then it’s not what I thought it was.”

  “Maybe it is,” he said, “and I just want us to get kicked off the streetcar.” He kissed her soft cheek. “I’ll be back with beignets. Extra powdered sugar. Decaf coffee for you.”

  “Kink and caffeine—the only two things I miss from BC.” Before Coco.

  “I promise, after the baby’s here and you’re ready, we’ll drink espresso and have kinky sex all night.”

  “That’s all I ask,” she said.

  Kingsley turned to leave, and she gave him a playful pinch on his French derriere on his way out of the kitchen. Really, she was a changed woman here. Relaxed, giggly, walls down, as if the city had gotten her drunk. He was falling in love with her all over again. The first time he fell for her, it was for her sorrow. Now he found himself falling even harder for her joy.

  If this is what life would be like when they moved to St. Bart’s, then he was ready to pack up today and leave the empire dismantling to the lawyers. Only, he knew it didn’t work that way. And even if it did, he’d promised Søren one last Christmas. How could he take that back? Especially since he hadn’t made that promise for Søren’s sake, but for his own.

  He strolled along the breezy sunlit streets of the Old Square, sunglasses on, which made it easier to note the appreciative glances he received from the female tourists that morning. Every sundress that walked past him did a double-take or, even bolder, shot him a smile. He was wearing his favorite jeans with a loose white button-down shirt half-tucked in, collar open, sleeves rolled up. He knew he looked like he’d just rolled out of the bed of a beautiful woman—which was accurate. When he passed the hostess at a French café, she smiled broadly at him. “Bonjour,” he said, forgetting to switch to English. He and Juliette always spoke French when alone together.

  The waitress replied, “Bonjour, Monsieur. Voulez-vous vous joindre à nous pour le petit déjeuner?”

  “Not today,” he replied—Pas aujourd-hui—hoping his look of surprise was hidden behind his sunglasses. “Maybe tomorrow.”

  She smiled broadly. A sure sign she was American, not French.

  “Your French is very good,” he said to her. She looked about twenty, a young Black college girl wearing the classic hostess uniform of a black skirt with a white blouse. “You’ve been to France?”

  “Not yet. I graduated from the Ecole Bilingue last year,” she said.

  “It’s a French school? Here?” He hadn’t realized they had French immersion schools in New Orleans. He assumed it was as French as Boston was Irish—in symbol and spirit, but not really.

  She nodded. “There are a few in town. They’re trying to bring the language back.”

  “You had good teachers. And I’m from Paris, so only my opinion counts.”

  She smiled again and made him promise to come for breakfast tomorrow with his girlfriend. A pinky swear was demanded and given. As Kingsley walked off toward Café du Monde, he caught himself feeling that same happiness he’d felt the night of his birthday. Only here, now, the fear was gone. Had he left it in Manhattan or lost it in New Orleans? Either way, laissez le bon temps rouler…

  Chapter Thirteen

  At noon they boarded a streetcar—not named Desire, sadly—for a tour of the Garden District. Kingsley had been to New Orleans before. Mardi Gras, years ago. His memory of the city was only of its nightlife. He had stayed out until dawn, returned to his hotel, and slept all day before going out again in the evening. Other than the parties and the parade, he hadn’t seen much of the city. He certainly hadn’t done any daylight tourist activities. Not his style. But Juliette loved looking at old houses—she had a Gothic streak in her bones a mile wide—and what made her happy made him happy.

  Shamelessly, Juliette took photo after photo with her phone, like every other tourist on the streetcar. When the tour guide, speaking in an almost-impenetrable Cajun accent, pointed out Anne Rice’s old house, Juliette took a dozen photos of it and immediately texted them to Nora.

  “She would love it here,” Juliette said. Kingsley had to agree. Mistress Nora would do well in a city known as The Big Easy. Art. Literature. Sin. Booze. What more could a porno-writing Catholic dominatrix want? Maybe they would come back next autumn, all of them together for one last hurrah before he and Juliette decamped to St. Bart’s.

  “Are you sure we have to leave Sunday?” Juliette asked as they turned a corner, and the streetcar eased slowly down a street so dense with ancient oaks that they blocked the sun.

  “We could try to get a hotel and stay another week, if you like.”

  “You probably have too much to do back home.”

  “If you want to stay, we’ll stay,” he said.

  She smiled, almost wistfully, and put her hand over her belly. “We have a doctor’s appointment on Tuesday. I shouldn’t miss it.”

  “We can come back after.” He put his arm around her shoulders. She nestled in closer to him…for about two seconds, before she decided she needed to hang out the side of the streetcar to take more photos. “I know you’re not looking forward to another winter in New York.”

  “Who would be?” she said without turning.

  “What would you say if I told you we only had to stay there one more winter?”

  Slowly, she lowered her phone and ducked back into the streetcar, a dozen beautiful old houses sliding by unseen, forgotten.

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “I mean…I want us to move away, start over somewhere safer. Warmer.”

  They had taken their seats near the back so they could speak without interrupting the other tourists. He was glad now that they had a little privacy. Juliette covered her mouth with her hand and glanced away.

  “It’ll be for the best,” he said. “I was thinking St. Bart’s. Safe, beautiful. Our children will grow up speaking French. We’ll get a villa there. No more winters.”

  She turned around and looked at him. “You can’t mean it.” S
he lowered her voice and added, “What about Søren?”

  “He knows.”

  Her lovely dark eyes widened. “You already told him?”

  “I already told him,” he said. “A few weeks ago. It’s done. Call it a fait accompli.”

  Because it was a fait accompli if he’d already told Søren. Because that was the hardest part, the biggest barrier, the only thing standing in their way. Nothing could stop them now.

  “But the clubs—”

  “We’ll sell them. Or I’ll find someone to take over The 8th Circle.”

  “Who would run it?”

  “The King is retired. Long live the Queen?”

  Juliette nodded. “Nora would do an excellent job. But the townhouse—”

  “We’ll sell it. We could buy ten of these,” he said, pointing at a row of ivy-draped Louisiana mansions, “for the price of one Manhattan townhouse on Riverside Drive.”

  Juliette shook her head—not to say no, but because she was clearly in shock and couldn’t quite take it all in yet. They rode the next few blocks in silence, not even hearing what their tour guide had to say about the cemetery, about the beads on the trees and fences…

  “I never let myself dream,” she said, and looked at him again. “But you already told him.”

  He nodded slowly.

  Again, she shook her head. “I thought you’d never give up the city and the clubs and the power…then I thought you might, after all that happened. But then you and he—and you were so happy, and I was happy for you, but I told myself now it would never happen. And that was fine. New York is fine. It’s only…”

  “It’s not where you want to be. And if you don’t want to be there, I don’t want to be there.”

  She rested against his chest again, her hand on his heart, and his chin on the top of her head.

  “You were right,” she said. “This is the best gift.”

  He kissed her hair. “You’re missing a good house,” he whispered.

  She sat back up and turned with her phone to take a picture of an enormous white mansion with a black iron fence surrounding it, a large yard filled with tropical plants and an imposing portico with four white columns. It was the sort of house children dream of living one day. A true dream house. Even now, Kingsley was daydreaming of their children playing hide-and-seek in a garden like that, playing fetch with a dog in a yard like that, growing up safe and coddled and spoiled and loved in a house like that.

  “If anyone has a spare eight million on them,” the tour guide said, “that one’s for sale. It’s a fixer-upper.”

  Juliette laughed and looked at him. “How much do you have in your wallet?”

  * * *

  After the streetcar tour, they went out in search of lunch. Juliette joked she was on the hobbit diet now that she was pregnant: first breakfast, second breakfast, elevenses, lunch, dinner, tea, supper. Kingsley was happy to indulge her. New Orleans had surprised him with the incredible variety and quality of their restaurants. The whole city was putting Manhattan to shame.

  As they strolled toward the cafe, hand in hand, Juliette said, “You know, St. Bart’s is tiny. I mean…teeny tiny. I checked my phone. The whole population is less than ten thousand people. Could you survive living in a small town on an island?”

  “For you I could.”

  “Have you ever lived on an island for longer than a month or two? It’s harder than people think. Especially if you’re not used to it. I was used to it, and even I got island fever.”

  “It doesn’t have to be St. Bart’s. I only thought of it because it was French and safe and one flight to see your mother. We could move to L.A. if you wanted, San Diego, Miami—”

  Suddenly she stopped and gave a little laugh. “Look,” she said, pointing.

  Across the street came a row of children, girls, all of them about nine or ten years old. They were wearing matching dresses, gray plaid with crisp white shirts and black cardigans. A young nun in a gray habit led them, a goose and her goslings.

  “Aww…” Juliette sighed and leaned against him. “They look just like Madeline.”

  “Who?”

  “The little French girl in the children’s books?” Juliette said as if he should know that. She recited a few lines for him:

  In an old house in Paris

  That was covered with vines

  Lived twelve little girls

  In two straight lines […]

  The smallest one was Madeline.

  “Boys didn’t read Madeline books,” he said.

  “I wanted to be her so badly,” Juliette said, shaking her head. “I had all the books and read them over and over. I remember getting in trouble for trying to color Madeline in with a brown crayon so she’d look more like me. But those girls, they look just like the girls in the books, except they do look like me.”

  The girls in the Catholic-school uniforms were Black like Juliette. Even the nun was Black. Juliette raised her hand and waved at the girls as they passed. They waved back, smiling broadly.

  “Are you having a baby?” one girl shouted across the street.

  “Yes, we are,” Juliette called back. “Soon!”

  Some of the girls applauded and a couple oooh-ed, which prompted the nun to turn and shush them. Kingsley laughed. This was not something that happened in Manhattan. If you waved at strangers across the street and talked with them, people would think you were mentally unstable. It seemed so natural here. So easy.

  Ah, The Big Easy. So that’s how it got its name.

  Juliette laughed, too, but her eyes were filled with tears, ready to spill.

  “Jules?”

  The girls turned the corner and disappeared. Juliette stared at where they had been and where they went as if she saw something he couldn’t see.

  “I never told you,” she said, “but I’ve been here before.”

  More secrets.

  “I thought this was your first trip,” Kingsley said. Was everyone in his life keeping secrets from him?

  “He brought me here, once. Only once.”

  He. The man who’d practically kept her a prisoner, blackmailing her into obedience. Juliette hardly ever spoke of him but when she did, she never said his name, only “he” or “him.”

  “I ran away from him here,” she said. “I was on my own for two days. When I remembered he was paying for my mother’s treatment, I went back. The two best days of my life were in this city.” She smiled. “Until you.”

  He held out his hand to her and she took it, squeezed it, met his eyes. “Let’s move here,” she said.

  “New Orleans.”

  “Why not? It’s French. It’s a big city, a real city. Far, far from New York. And Coco would grow up with children that looked like her, or him. And the music and the food…”

  He held up his hand. “If this is what you want—”

  “It’s what I want.”

  “It’s settled then,” he said. “We’ll start looking for houses.”

  “Good. But lunch first, please.”

  They sat at a table outside on the café’s patio. Eating outside in January? Maybe August would be hell, but it would be worth going through it for this—Juliette in a bright yellow sundress and sandals in the middle of winter, happier than he’d seen her since the day she first felt the baby kick, when the theoretical had become so wonderfully real.

  While Juliette was in the bathroom, Kingsley sent Søren a message.

  We’re still moving, but it’s New Orleans, not St. Bart’s.

  Without waiting for a reply, he added, I miss you, and immediately he wished he hadn’t.

  Juliette returned, and he helped her into her chair. As she perused the specials, she suddenly looked up. She smiled, then hid her face behind the menu.

  “What? What is it?” Kingsley asked.

  “Don’t look behind you,” she whispered.

  He immediately looked behind him. Two priests in black clerical garb and Roman collars—a white priest, white-haired, ab
out sixty, and a young Korean priest, not more than thirty—took a table at the opposite end of the patio. Before they could say anything, their waitress came to the table with their coffee.

  “Morning, Katie,” the younger priest said with a wave to their waitress.

  “Morning, Father Lee.” She smiled at Kingsley and Juliette. “Cream and sugar?”

  “Please,” Juliette said. “And do you know those priests?’

  “They’re in all the time. Jesuits from the college. They get free coffee here.”

  The waitress walked over to the priests and joined them in friendly conversation.

  “You think it’s a sign?” Juliette said.

  “Definitely,” Kingsley said. “I’ll just trade in my Jesuit for a new one.”

  Juliette reached across the table and took his hand in hers. “Thank you, my love,” she said softly. Merci, mon amour. “We’ll find a way to make this work. For all of us.”

  “Are you happy?”

  “Very.”

  “Then it’s already working,” he said, squeezing her hand. “Merry Christmas, my jewel.”

  “Merry Christmas, mon roi.”

  As Kingsley went to put his phone away—he considered texting during a meal to be a mortal sin—it buzzed in his hand. A cryptic reply from Søren.

  Much better.

  Fourth Movement

  February Sonata

  Sonata:

  An instrumental musical composition typically of three or four movements in contrasting forms and keys.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Kingsley gazed into the pit below him. Quiet this Monday evening, far quieter than the madness of a Friday or Saturday. Not empty, however. A dominant man wearing only leather trousers and full sleeve tattoos worked his submissive girlfriend over with a flogger on a St. Andrew’s Cross. One of the “littles” who belonged to a man called Papa Bear was swinging upside-down from a harness, her frilly panties on full display as her dress hung over her head. Otherwise, fairly subdued down there.