Chapter 679

Dessie and Phillip at the Castle

Six weeks earlier continued.

... Dessie and Phillip passed a glance. “We were planning on leaving first thing in the morning, but we can certainly put our hiking off for a day or two, don’t you think, Hon?” Dessie asked her husband.

“We were in a hurry to set up camp by those waterfalls and do... nothing,” he said as he grinned at Mia. “We can do nothing in a few days just as we could do nothing day after tomorrow.”

Dessie summed it up. “So, we’ll gladly wait.”

“Excellent. I know that Glenda and Karl will be glad you’re still here. As for now, want to walk out to my special place?” Mia asked. “You haven’t seen it at night yet.”

“You bet,” Dessie answered for both of them.

The sun was just a glow on the horizon by the time they were past the marked path and following the barely-distinguishable trail into the woods. As they neared Mia’s area, she stopped to move a stone which revealed a housing with a waterproof switch that she turned on.

Hundreds of mini-lights suddenly outlined the trail, and to a lesser extent, the waterfalls, stream and the pool farther along. There was only the faint rustling of wind in the tops of the trees to go with the sound of the water.

“Oh, my goodness. It’s even prettier at night,” Dessie gasped out.

“Truly superb,” Phillip added.

“Come on,” Mia said with a smile as she grabbed Dessie’s hand. “Let’s all go sit on the bench. I haven’t done that in a very long time.”

“No, Mia,” Dessie quietly said. “That’s your special place. We might sit on it from time to time, since you invited us to do so. However, we can’t sit on it with you. Your husband designed it for the two of you.”

Mia turned to face Dessie and Phillip fully before reaching to take their hands for a moment. “I’ve been here only a very few times since Stefan died, but I want to share the view with you two — especially after what you have done for me today.”

Phillip cleared his throat nervously. “Look, Mia. What we did had nothing to do with this.”

“Oh, yes it does,” she insisted. “I want you to enjoy this with me.”

“Are you sure, Mia?” Dessie asked.

“I’m certain, and I’m also certain that Stefan would think it’s proper. Now come on,” she demanded as they followed her through the last of the bushes that guarded the path to the bench.

Moments later, they were seated on the padded bench with its view of the stream, the water wheel and the swimming area farther along, everything softly outlined with the mini-lights.

“Oh, it’s beautiful,” Dessie said as she turned to Mia, only to realize there was a sparkle of tears on her cheeks. Abruptly, Dessie realized that Mia must have planned this because she already had a tissue out.

“Mia, we need to go. We’ll meet you back at the castle. This is your place. Yours and your husband’s. We’re encroaching in your personal area.”

“No, you’re not,” Mia insisted. “I couldn’t come out here at night — not alone. Not after Stefan and I had been out here so much late at night. Karl and Glenda were around when my husband was alive — we were all friends — but I somehow didn’t want to come out here with them, even back then. Somehow, you two have become very special to me, and that was before you paid off my bills. I just want to share the peacefulness of this place with you two. I know that you will be gone from my life once your vacation is over, so I want to show this to you tonight.”

After they were all seated, Mia continued, “I’m certain I will never marry again. I can’t replace Stefan, and I’m not going to try. Still, I wanted to share the tranquility of this wonderful place my husband built for me. With the few people we have in the castle tonight, there will never be a better time, and I wanted to do it before you left on your extended backpacking trip.”

Dessie had to wipe her eyes, and she could feel the tension as her husband’s hand gripped hers.

“We’re very humbled that you would share something this personal with us,” Phillip quietly said, his voice stumbling a little. “And you’re right. We’ll probably always be friends. If you ever need anything, all you have to do is call. And Mia, we’re flattered by your generosity.”

They sat for a long time, none of them in a hurry to leave the peace of the moment, the only interruption an occasional quiet word or comment between them.

Finally, Mia stood, as did the other two a second later. Mia hugged each of them before stepping back a pace. “Hopefully not to sound too dramatic, but somehow it feels as if a burden has been lifted from my heart. I know that Stefan would have liked you two — probably a lot. It just seems so unfair that he would have to die after all he did to make the castle possible, and this...” she said as she gestured. “I just had to share it with you.” Then, after a moment, she grabbed Dessie’s hand. “Come on; let’s get back. I have a bottle of champagne that I’ve been saving for just the right moment, and I think sharing it while sitting on my private deck with my new dear friends would be just perfect.”

Back at the castle, Mia led them to her apartment, then on out onto her private deck. “You two, please find yourselves seats, and I’ll be back in a moment.”

“I’ll help you,” Dessie said as she gave her husband a quick kiss before following Mia back inside.

As Mia went down the hallway to get the bottle of champagne out of the wine cooler, Dessie checked out the kitchen. Everything was spotless, just as she expected. It would be foolish for Mia to do much cooking on her own since Sophia has to prepare the meals for their guests, anyway.

Mia was back in only a couple of minutes with a bottle of champagne. “Had it not been for Sophia and Fisher, I would have become an alcoholic,” she quietly said. “When I refused to get up, Sophia literally dragged me out of bed, made me get dressed and out of the castle. She threw my booze away, made me go for walks with her, and generally made me take part in life again. Fischer basically ran the place while I had been withdrawn into myself. I owe everything to them. Now, your husband is probably wondering what happened to us.”

Back on the deck, Mia had softened the lights before handing the bottle to Phillip. “Would you open this, please? When I do it, there tends to be champagne everywhere.”

Phillip suspected that Stefan had usually opened the wine and was flattered that Mia wanted him to. He tucked the base of the bottle against his lower stomach, unwound the wire and set it aside. Slowly, he unscrewed the bottle from the top while holding the top firmly against the bottle, lest the cork should shoot out and champagne go everywhere.

There was a louder pop than he expected. Amazing himself, he didn’t lose any of the liquid.

The women held the glasses while he poured. “To Stefan,” Mia said as they touched glasses with tears trickling down her cheeks. After they sipped, the two women sat on the swing talking quietly until Mia’s tears stopped.

Phillip found a nicely padded chaise lounge a few feet away and relaxed, only offering an occasional comment to the girls’ conversation. A few minutes later, he nodded off.

“I apologize for the tears,” Mia began, but Dessie immediately shut her down.

“Don’t you dare apologize after sharing your special place with us. We just wish that we could have known him.”

Mia changed the subject to Dessie and Phillip’s backpacking plans, and the somber mood shifted little by little as the women discussed amounts and types of foods to take on the extended trip.

When they remembered Phillip, they realized that he was sound asleep on the padded chaise lounge he had chosen.

“He’s a truly good man, isn’t he?” Mia asked, more statement than question.

“Better than I will ever deserve,” Dessie quietly answered. “Look, I...” she started but faltered.

“It sounds as if you might want to share something with me. I’m not sleepy, and I don’t have to get up early in the morning. If you want to share with me, I would be flattered, but I don’t want to force you into talking about something that you had rather not...”

Dessie glanced at her husband sleeping so soundly a dozen feet away, then turned back to Mia. “You might very well not want to associate with me after I tell you this. You’re right, though. I do want to tell someone. Until now, there wasn’t anyone I could tell. Oh, my husband and I have discussed it over and over, but...”

Mia motioned with the champagne bottle, but Dessie shook her head. “Be back in a moment,” Mia said as she took the still half-full bottle inside to put it in the wine cooler. When she returned, she was carrying a light blanket. Dessie smiled and nodded her approval, and Mia spread it over Phillip.

After she again sat with Dessie, Mia apologized. “As I said, I almost became an alcoholic, and I don’t want to be tempted by an open bottle of something that almost made me into an alcoholic. I was pleased to see that neither you nor Phillip seemed enthused about the champagne, but I wanted to do something to mark the occasion, I suppose you could say.”

Dessie reached to put her hand atop Mia’s as she again sat in the swing with the other woman. “To understate, neither Phillip nor I are heavy drinkers, so there’s nothing to apologize for, but I suppose the champagne has relaxed me enough for me to consider telling someone about my woes. I’ve never discussed this with anyone not already involved; however, I think I need to let you know just what kind of person I am. After I tell you, though, you might not want us to be around you.”

“Oh, it can’t be that bad, and ... even if it should be, I think I’ll always be your friend. Besides, my curiosity has been piqued by now.”

“Okay, here goes.” With that, Dessie began to share the last few years of her life with Mia.

Mia was giggling as she said, “I can just see that tiny baby girl as she looked up at what, to her, must have been your husband’s towering figure while dressing him down for not installing a seat on the commode suitable for her — and a step so she could climb up to the commode.” The giggling soon morphed into laughter as Mia heard about the child psychologists having been outclassed in their own profession, again, by a tiny figure many times smaller than they were. However, when Dessie told about the swapping and what it had led to, Mia was soon appalled and shedding tears with Dessie.

The two women talked long into the night, each sharing secrets they had never discussed with anyone before.

Finally, Mia said, “Dessie, we all make mistakes. I wasn’t a virgin when I married Stefan — far from it. At sixteen, I gave my virginity to a boy who lived near me. We remained boyfriend and girlfriend until I got drunk at Uni and wound up in bed with a guy who had been trying to ‘date’ me for months. He bragged about fucking me to my boyfriend, who put him in the hospital. The guy, who was much bigger than my boyfriend, was too embarrassed to admit that Hans had so easily won the fight, refusing to say who had beaten him up. When Hans eventually discovered that the guy wasn’t lying, he dropped me in a very public way. After that, I did not date until I met Stefan, and on our third date, I told him what I had done. I expected him to leave, but he said he had made a fool of himself before and supposed it was part of becoming an adult — provided — that I had learned from my ‘mistake.’”