Happy Birthday to Me Again (Birthday Trilogy, Book 2) (4 page)

I passed by my
sister and her middle school boyfriend, and made my way out into the freezing cold.

“Sorry I’m
late,” she said.

“That’s OK. Come
on inside, it’s freezing out here.”

I wrapped my arm
around Liesel’s shoulders and guided her into my sprawling,
six-thousand-square-foot home, located up in the hills of Caughlin Ranch on the
outskirts of Reno.

I passed Kimber
just as she was waved to the departing Tommy. She had an infectious smile on
her face, the kind I last saw when I surprised her at her nighttime recital
last May.

I don’t believe it,
I thought.
My little sister’s in love.
 

---

My father
clinked his knife against one of the water glasses and managed to get all nine
occupants at the table to quiet down. He stood up and smiled at my mom, who was
sitting to the left of him.

“Before we
begin, I just wanted to thank you all for coming,” my dad said, his voice just
barely louder than the Frank Sinatra holiday music blasting over the speakers,
“and I wanted to thank my wife for making, once again, a delicious Christmas
Eve dinner.”

Everyone at the
table applauded my mom, who took a subtle bow from her chair and immediately
sipped a glass of her expensive Zinfandel wine.

“I also wanted
to welcome Margaret and Darlene to our table,” he said. “It’s been far too many
years, Margaret. And we’re happy to see an addition to our family here with your
lovely bride.”

The two ladies
kissed, leaving my mom and grandmother Fay grinning, and my grandfather rolling
his eyes.

“And most of
all,” my dad said, turning his eyes toward me, “I wanted to say how lucky we
are to have both my children here for Christmas. As you all know, we had a bit
of a scare earlier this year, but we pulled through, and life, truly, has never
been better.” He lifted his glass of wine into the air. “Here’s to my son,
Cameron. Thanks for not leaving us.”

I could see my
mom fighting back tears as everyone clinked their glasses together, my aunt
Margaret waving at me from across the table, her partner Darlene seemingly
confused, and Liesel trying to avoid eye contact with everyone at the table.
Nobody knew, of course, that Liesel was the perpetrator of my initial illness.
And nobody would
ever
know but me. My
parents only knew that I woke up that warm June morning back to normal without
any reasonable explanation, like the whole event had been nothing but a vicious
nightmare. I of course told no one that Liesel had come to visit me that night
in the hospital, using her magical powers to cure me of the life-threatening
disease she had set upon me just two and a half months prior. Liesel was going
to be around for a while, and I needed her on my family’s good side.

I readied myself
to stand up to make my big speech, but my mom beat me to it. “And if I may,”
she said. She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. She was clearly
tearing up, and I watched as my dad pulled her hands down to his chest.

“It’s OK,
honey,” he said.

“Cam, you’ll
never know what that time was like for me,” my mom said, only connecting her
eyes with mine sporadically. “That helpless, vulnerable feeling. It’s something
I never want to experience again. But what really… you know… ripped me apart,
was those last few days, when I had nothing left to do but say good-bye to
you…”

God, what a morbid pre Christmas dinner
conversation we’re having,
I thought.
It’s OK, everyone. I’m fine
now. I’ll be fine for a long, long time.

My mom licked
her lips and exhaled loudly. “Cameron, I am so,
so
thrilled that you are here with us, more handsome than ever… in
love…
happy
...” She smiled at Liesel
before turning back to me. “I couldn’t be more grateful. I love you.”

“I love you,
too, Mom.”

“And whatever
you choose to do with your life,” she continued, “your father and I are here to
support you. We feel like we’ve been given a second chance with you, and we’re
not going to take it lightly.”

I nodded.
OK, can we eat now?

“Here here!” my
grandfather shouted, reaching for the honey glazed ham. My grandmother slapped
his hand away and shook her head with disapproval.
“And on a lighter note,” my mom said, “before we begin, I also wanted to say
one other thing… this time about
Kimber
.”
She locked eyes with my sister. “Do you want me to tell them, or do you want
to, honey?”

My sister
started rocking her chair back and forth, like she wanted to start dancing to
the music of Perry Como currently playing over our heads. She smiled big and
nodded at my mom. “No, no. You can.”

“What is it?” my
dad asked.

She better not be pregnant,
I thought, taking Liesel’s right hand and
turning toward my sister, who was once again happy as can be.

“Last September,”
my mom continued, “Kimber applied for only one of two slots available
in—get ready for this mouthful—the Silver State Strings Sensations
Scholarship program.”

“I remember you
telling me about that,” my dad said. “So what happened?”

“Can we start
eating yet?” my grandpa yelled. My grandma slammed her hand over his mouth to
let my mom finish.

My mom put her
left hand on her hip and raised her glass of wine with her right. “Only two
middle school students in all of Nevada were chosen to be a part of the violin
recital next June, to be performed in front of the President of the United
States himself, in Washington D.C.—”

“They picked
me!” Kimber shouted.

That’s why she’s been in such a good
mood.
“
Kimber
?” I shouted. “That’s great! I’m
so proud of you!”

“Yeah, that’s
awesome,” Liesel added before looking at me. “Do you get to go to that?”

“I don’t know.”
I turned to Mom. “Do I get to go?”

She smiled at
everyone in the intimate setting. Elton John’s “Step into Christmas” started
playing overhead. “They’re paying for ten round-trip tickets. We can
all
go!”

It was after
that announcement that everyone at the table forgot about the freezing cold
food in front of them and started applauding, kissing each other, smiling ear
to ear.

Liesel might
have been the most excited one of all. “Washington D.C.? I can’t believe it!
I’ve never even been to the east coast!”

My mom took a
seat and dumped some fruit on her plate. “How far have you traveled, Liesel?”

“I’ve only been
to California and Nevada. Nowhere else.”

“
Nowhere
else?”

“It’s not that I
haven’t wanted to travel more. I’ve just never had anyone to take me anywhere.”

Liesel took my
arm and kissed me on my cheek. Everyone seemed to enjoy the rare PDA from me
and Liesel, except my grandfather.

“I’m eating,” he
said. “And nobody can stop me.”

He started
tearing his slab of ham apart like a ravenous mountain lion, and the rest of us
followed suit. More details about Kimber’s upcoming show in D.C. were
discussed, as well as how Margaret and Darlene met, and how my grandfather’s
three-year case of shingles, which manifested itself painfully near his left
eye, had finally started calming down in recent months.
 

“Who wants
dessert?” my mom asked, nearly an hour after we had started eating dinner, and
I knew my time for making the one final announcement of the evening was
dwindling. “I’ve got two different kinds of pies, as well as my famous pumpkin
cake. Eat every last crumb, because I don’t want to look at these things after
tonight!”

She departed the
room with my aunt Margaret for a minute, and then returned with an apple pie, a
lemon meringue pie, and a pumpkin marble cake, the latter of which she set
right in front of me.

The cream cheese
frosted cake, surprisingly, had a candle lit in the center of it.

What the—

My mom started
to sing the dreaded song, the one that would haunt me for the rest of my life.
“Happy birthday to you…”

Everyone joined
in, except for Liesel, who seemed as perplexed as I was.

Noooooo… noooooo… it’s not my birthday!

“…Happy birthday
to you…”

I wanted to
start throwing plates against the wall, silverware, drawers, cats,
anything
, to make it stop. My attention
veered toward Liesel, who had her eyes closed, and her fingers pressed inside
her ears. I decided to follow suit.
It’s
been nearly seven months, Liesel. Don’t break your non-magic steak streak now.
Please. Please!

“…Happy birthday
dear Darlene…”

I heard the last
word pretty clearly through my echoing eardrums, and I peered across the table
to see Darlene standing up, shaking her head, surprised as can be. “I can’t
believe this. Oh my God, that’s so nice.”

“…Happy birthday
to you!”

Darlene leaned
over the table and blew out the candle. I watched as the smoke rose all the way
up to the ceiling. I elbowed Liesel, signaling to her that she could come up
for air.

“It’s OK,” I
whispered. “That wasn’t meant for either of us.”

“What can I
say?” Darlene shouted across the table. “It’s always been hard to have a
Christmas Eve birthday. But I must say I wouldn’t want to spend it with anyone
but all of you!”

Margaret
smooched her beloved on the lips again, and now I could swear that on my life
I’d seen the two lesbians kiss more in the last two hours than I’d seen my own
parents kiss in my entire lifetime.
 

I turned to
Liesel. She looked so luminous tonight, her green eyes sparkling, her dark red
lips so inviting, my love for her growing each and every day. I was sure. I was
certain.

The time is now.

My mom started
serving slices of the pumpkin cake on paper plates when I clinked my knife a
few times against my glass of water.

I stood up as my
grandfather shouted, “No more speeches!” My grandmother slugged him in the
chest.

My mom finished
serving the dessert and sat back down in her seat. “What is it, Cameron?”

I now had all
eyes in the room focused on me. Not even Liesel knew what I was about to say.

“This is a
really good night,” I said. “I’m surrounded by people I love, who I deeply care
about, and I’m so thankful that I got a second chance to live my life. As you
all know, it’s been a bit of a rough road these last few months to get back to
normal. What I went through… well… to call it traumatizing would be an
understatement. I’ve now seen what I’m going to look like when I’m Grandpa’s
age…” I looked at my grandfather, who was paying more attention to his pumpkin
cake than my speech.
 
“But I’ve
managed to put the events of my senior year behind me, and move on. I know it
might have been disappointing to some of you for me to delay my admission to
Yale for a year, but I think I needed this extra time to figure out what I
really wanted to do, and who I really wanted to spend the rest of my life
with.”

I allowed the
awkward silence to creep into the air. My mom and dad looked at each other with
confusion, and Liesel looked up at me with great anticipation.

“What those
painful two and a half months taught me was how much of a selfish jerk I’d been
to so many people. And I needed Liesel here to show me the way. To show me the
kind of guy I was capable of being, the kind of guy I was meant to be all
along. I don’t know where I’d be today without her. She’s not only been the
love of my life for the last seven months… she’s become my best friend.”

I took Liesel’s
left hand, and I could see her eyes tearing up. She bit down on her lower lip
and smiled. “Cameron…” she said.

I looked out at
everyone at the table. Even my grandfather was finally paying attention to my
speech. “I know this may seem sudden to many of you. I know I’m only eighteen
years old, with many more years ahead of me. But unlike the rest of you, I’ve
seen
what the rest of my life holds for
me. And I don’t want to live it… without my Liesel.”

Liesel looked
afraid to take another breath as I pushed my chair against the table, and to
the surprise of everyone, no more so than to my mom and dad, I got down on one
knee and brought my gaze to the gorgeous young woman in front of me.

“Liesel Maupin…”

Both of her
hands were set against her chest. I saw a tear fall down her left cheek as she
leaned toward me.

I licked my
lips, took a deep breath, and turned my head down toward the hardwood floor. I
brought up a small black case and opened it. Inside was a beauty, a half carat
diamond ring in white gold.

“…Would you
marry me?”

Her mouth
remained agape, but she didn’t say anything for a moment. Instead, the ground
beneath us started to shake.