HOLT

I wake the next morning in a position I thought I would never be in again. Next to Sylvie. But not just next to her. My arms encase her as if I am worried she might try to run again if I don’t keep her close.

Doesn’t that sum up our whole relationship? Her running. Me never wanting to let go.

This morning, though, I make a special exception. Leaving her warm, naked body to get up and dress. My board presentation is early this afternoon. But instead of doing a few dry runs yesterday like I should have, I spent most of the evening making curried goat and an “appropriate side” with Sylvie.

I don’t regret a thing. But I do have to play catch up this morning. Which means reviewing the main points of my 45-minute speech with room for Q&A at the end while I clock eight miles on the treadmill in my building’s gym.

When I return to the penthouse, all thoughts of my speech fall away. Sylvie is in the shower. Speaking of things we never did before…

I grab another condom and step inside the enclosed glass space to show her how good I am at standing up on my own in the shower these days. I can stand and hold her, too. I take her against the shower’s gray marble wall. Explaining with my actions just how much I’ve changed.

Sylvie’s screams are my reward, and my yell when I come is my confirmation. It will always be like this with her. As much as I have tried to suppress and kill what I feel, I now know my feelings will not fade as they did with Tish. The thing is, I liked Tish a lot at first. She was pretty and refined and cynical—the perfect wife for a secretly-tortured billionaire. But I never loved Tish. Not in the way I love Sylvie. I never belonged to Tish the way I belong to Sylvie.

As we rinse off after, I wonder how long it will take before Sylvie understands this, too.

I reluctantly part ways with her after we finish with our second soap and rinse off of the morning. I need to change.

I put on the dark blue suit I chose for the meeting. But just as I am about to attach the set of silver cufflinks I inherited from Grandpa Hank, I freeze. A melody floats out of the open bathroom door and into the bedroom.

It’s not the first song I have heard this morning. Sylvie has been playing tracks by some R&B singer I never heard of since we left the shower.

But this song is different. The underlying melody…it reminds me of our summer in New Haven. Dreamy and lovely… before things fell apart.

Moments later, I’m at the open bathroom door, cufflinks in hand. I listen to the song and watch Sylvie work some product through her unbraided hair. Totally entranced.

“What was that song?” I ask when the playlist switches to a more upbeat number.

Sylvie visibly startles, but eventually says, “’Jahraymecofasola.’ It’s a song by Jill Scott.”

“Jill Scott,” I repeat. A new-to-me singer, but her voice reminds me of Sylvie’s. Soft, melodic, and unbelievably kind.

“I like it,” I say. It’s three words, but to me it’s as if I’ve confessed a whole paragraph. I forgive you. We can get past what happened that summer. Fall in love with me again, because I never fell out of love with you, even when I most wanted to.

Aloud I say, “Come with me.”

Sylvie tilts her head. “Come with you where?”

“To my fundraiser. You said I treated you like dirt while I treated that ballet dancer like gold. So, come with me tonight. Let me treat you like gold.”

Her expression softens with a yes, but then like the most predictable thing ever, it waivers with all the reasons why she should say no.

We’ll work on that this time around, I decide. Her self-esteem and her fear—of me and of herself.

But for now, I’ll have to force the issue like the Old Holt would rather than the version 3.0 I am trying so hard to become for her.

“Okay. Allie will take care of the arrangements. I don’t know if I can come back here before the event begins since Little Rock is in the opposite direction of the botanical gardens. But I’ll try. Otherwise, I can meet you there.”

I don’t wait for an answer. Instead, I quickly head out the door, pretending I can’t hear her protest that “maybe this is not such a good idea,” and “I don’t have anything to wear.”

The song follows me in the elevator down to the ground floor. And then to our headquarters in Calsonville, which used to be called something else forty years ago, before Grandpa made them change their name as part of our headquarters building deal. It plays in the back of my mind while Allie walks me through my morning briefing (thankfully, there are no Wes incidents even though we left him with someone other than Sylvie).

By the time I finish a slew of handshake pre-board meetings, I’ve become used to the melody. And it continues to loop like a calm reminder of the love I once had and will have again as I make my way to the second to last board meeting of the year. Oddly, I don’t feel nervous when I walk into the crowded boardroom. I give my speech about what I’ve done for the company in the past two years, and what I plan to do in the next two. It’s well received. Even if my father looks annoyed when the rest of the board members clap.

But for once, I don’t care that my father’s main setting seems to be disapproval when it comes to me. I handshake my way out of the room, that song still playing in my head, and I curse the one-on-one meetings I packed into the end of the day because all I really want is to get back to Sylvie.

I rush through the meetings, speaking with each board member individually. I may want to be the CEO of Cal-Mart. But I need Sylvie.

However, just as I am about to go to my last meeting of the day, Della pops her head into my office with an apologetic, “Hi, Holt. Just want make sure you have a hard copy of the speech you’re supposed to give at the botanical garden tonight.”

“Shit, I completely forgot about that,” I say, accepting the multi-page document she waves at me.

“Have you given any more thought to taking that local news anchor, Pamela Acton, as your plus one?” Della asks. “I sent her bio over a few days ago, and she’s really excited to meet you and available tonight.”

“I already have a date,” I mumble, flipping through the speech. The very long speech.

“Oh, you do?” Della says, surprise evident in her tone. “Anyone I know?”

“No, it’s not,” I answer shortly. “Do I have to be off-book for this?”

Della seems surprised by my question, but then resets, smoothing her long red hair as she says, “This is the fundraiser we invited all the local Cal-Mart employees to. The purpose is to brand you as a CEO who truly cares about the people who work for you. So yes, it would be ideal if your talking points seem like they come from the heart.”

In other words, I have to a memorize another 45-minute speech or risk looking like an asshole. I glance at my watch and sigh before texting Sylvie, “Stuck in office. Will meet you there.”

I ignore her reply which starts with “Maybe I shouldn’t…”

Not today, little rabbit, not today, I think as I change the speech with a red pen.

But when I reach the final paragraph, instead of rewriting the last line so it reads, “Will you please join me in giving the Botanical Gardens a big round of applause?” I write, “Will you marry me?”

And that’s when the idea hits me. I rush through our now empty offices, hoping Della hasn’t already left to oversee the event set up.

But I stop short in the hallway outside her open door. She’s talking to someone.

“… he said he already has a date.”

“Who with? Tell me it ain’t that black nanny of his…” a gruff voice replies. A gruff voice I instantly recognize as belonging to my father.

“I don’t know. I asked but he didn’t say,” Della replies.

“Well, can you find out, darlin’?” my father asks, his boss voice dropping into the flirtatious tone he uses with the women he’s dating.

Della giggles, “I’ll try again.”

The next thing I hear are the sounds of a very workplace inappropriate makeout session. I linger in the hall, trying to process what I just heard. It appears my father hasn’t given up meddling in my life like he used to back in New Haven—

That’s when a much bigger realization hits. I remember the flash of Sylvie’s eyes as she says, “I am not taking any more Calson money.” Not “money from you” but “Calson money.” I thought she’d just been talking about her salary, but now…

The story of how Sylvie and I fell apart that long-ago summer suddenly begins to rewrite itself in my mind.