Iris in Bloom: Take a Chance, Book 2 (20 page)

No. He’d go by after school.

As he scraped a razor across his chin he wondered if flowers would be too much.

He got to school and discovered that his students had all clearly made a pact with each other over the weekend to drive him crazy. They’d ‘forgotten’ to do their homework or sat looking at him blankly when he asked a question in class. Even his creative writing students acted like they had better places to be.

He felt like yelling to them that he had places he’d rather be, too!

By the time the final bell rang, releasing him and his students from the frustration of facing each other, he couldn’t get away fast enough.

He recognized the feeling now as simple excitement. He was crazy in love with Iris. He couldn’t waste a moment letting her know that.

Stopping for flowers would take ten minutes and he suddenly felt that he didn’t have ten extra minutes. He didn’t have ten extra seconds to waste before telling her how he felt and pulling her into his arms. Once she believed that, and if she returned his sentiments, which he had to believe she did, then everything else was details.

When he got to Sunflower he felt the urgency return. He jumped out of his car, strode to the door and when he opened it the cascade of metal sunflowers jingled merrily as though welcoming him back.

He stepped through the doorway, his heart already thumping, and didn’t immediately see Iris as he’d hoped. The younger girl with the crazy hair was there. Dosana he remembered in a flash.

When she saw him her eyes went wide.

“Hi Dosana,” he said, wondering why she’d looked at him as though he were either a ghost or a serial killer.

“H-hi, ah, Geoff.” She turned to rattle the big assed barista machine. “What can I get you?”

“Nothing right now. Is Iris in the back?” He hoped she’d hear his voice and come out.

“No. No. She’s not here.” She emptied wet grounds out of the coffee ground holder thing with a bang, her back to him.

His plan couldn’t be unraveling already. “But she’s always here.”

“She had an appointment.” She turned, still not looking at him and a really bad feeling stole over him like a cloud obscuring the sun.

“What kind of appointment?” They were the only two in the place but still he lowered his voice.

She met his gaze and then dropped hers again. “I can’t tell you. I’m sorry.”

“Tell me she’s not following that stupid plan of hers?”

Dosana didn’t answer and how could she, anyway. He was mostly talking to himself. He felt so much anger and disappointment he could barely see straight.

“Couldn’t she at least have waited until we talked?”

“Maybe she thought you weren’t into talking?” she said and he felt that she was trying to help him out a little bit. Like maybe she was no more a fan of Iris’s visit to the sperm bank than he was.

“Is she at the fertility clinic?”

“I didn’t tell you that.”

“Understood. What time’s her appointment?”

She squeezed her eyes shut. “What are you going to do?”

“Nothing. Try and talk her out of it before it’s too late.”

She glanced up at the big ceramic clock Iris’s mother had given her for her birthday. The night he and she first made love. It said four-ten.

“I think you might already be too late.”

“What time was her appointment?”

“Four.”

“Directions?”

“You didn’t get this from me.”

“Noted. Come on! You don’t want her to do this either. Give me the damn directions.”

She gave him the damn directions. Then said, “Good luck.”

He nodded. Ran out of the door, the foolish bells laughing at him as he exited.

Chapter Twenty-One

The clinic was easy to find. By four-twenty he was running into the clinic like a crazy man. All he could think was that every medical professional he’d ever consulted had made him wait. It was like they taught a whole course in med school on how long you should make patients wait.

But to his horror a quick glance around the waiting room showed two women pretending to read magazines. Neither of them was Iris.

He walked up to the desk and an attractive, slim woman who looked past the age of child rearing asked, “Can I help you?”

“I’m looking for Iris Chance,” he said.

“She’s not here.”

“But her appointment was for four o’clock.” He hoped if he offered information the woman would believe he actually knew Iris.

“I know. But she’s gone.”

For a second he could only stare stupidly at the woman as it dawned on him that he was too late.

He turned blindly for the door, mumbling something that might have been, “Thanks,” but didn’t sound like anything but an incoherent stammer.

He stepped outside onto the sidewalk and simply stood there. The day had been bright but now was cooling off. The few people on the street weren’t dawdling. They were striding purposefully to wherever they were headed.

If he had a clue where he was headed, maybe he’d be moving quickly too. Instead he felt stuck here. Turned to stone. Outside a fertility clinic of all places.

He felt like he’d been kicked, and hard. The thought of driving home held no appeal. Truthfully, not much did. He hunched into his jacket, pushed his hands in his pockets and started walking. No idea where he was going. Just walking.

The medical office gave way to a dental clinic, then a cosmetic place offering something called a non-surgical facelift, then a drug store, and a yoga studio with an organic juice counter.

He kept walking. He thought if he hit a bar he’d be tempted to head on in and have a beer. Watch whatever sport was on the big screen.

He passed an organic grocer and next to it was a coffee shop. He glanced idly in the window and then stopped dead.

Iris was sitting alone at a table with a cup of coffee in front of her. Unlike every other patron in there, she had no companion, no book, no newspaper, computer, smart phone or other electronic device in front of her. She was staring at the cup of coffee almost as though she were planning to have a dialogue with it.

For a second he thought he was seeing things, but no, that woman with the long hair tied back, the flowered top, jeans and boots, the face that lit up his world, that was his Iris.

He walked inside and headed to where she was sitting.

She glanced up and her eyes widened.

He didn’t have any idea what he was going to say, but words came out of his mouth.

“I don’t care,” he said.

“Pardon?”

“I don't care.” Realizing that he was maybe talking a little on the loud side and other people were beginning to notice, he sat in the empty chair across from her.

“What are you doing here?” A delicate blush suffused her cheeks and he wondered if she could already have that pregnant glow people talked about. He’d never seen her look prettier.

“I tried to stop you. I went to the clinic but I was too late. I—“ He felt the tiredness, the emotional fatigue and the shock of finding out that all his crazy rush to get his divorce hadn’t made a damn bit of difference. “I wanted to stop you.”

Her eyes seemed big and mysterious and yet as familiar as his own face in the mirror. How was that possible? And how could you love someone this much knowing she’d done something that would forever change your view of your life?

He had no idea. Love, like life itself, was sometimes more mystery than he liked.

“Why?” she asked.

There were fifty things he could say but only one thing that mattered. “Because I’m in love with you.”

If anything her eyes grew larger and more luminous. He could never describe them and all the poets he’d read and studied and taught over the years couldn’t come close to describing the beauty of Iris as he saw her now.

“You’re in love with me?”

“Yes. And hell if I know why. You’re impatient, misguided, so busy listening to everyone else’s problems that you won’t face your own, you won’t even try to trust me, are probably pregnant right now with another man’s child and I don’t care.” He stopped to breathe.

“You don’t care if I’m pregnant with another man’s child?”

It was slightly irritating that she kept repeating what he’d said but at least it proved she was listening to him.

“Of course I care. That should be my baby. Our baby. But I can’t stop loving you. That is never going to happen.”

She pushed her barely touched coffee aside and since her hands were out on the table top he took them in his. They were cold, he noticed. He wanted to wrap her in warmth and take care of her.

She didn’t pull away which he figured was a good sign. In fact, her fingers trembled a little. “What are you saying?”

“What? Am I speaking Dutch? I love you. Iris, I want to marry you.”

“But you’re—”

“No. I’m not.” Finally he could put an end to that objection. “I am not married. Okay, that isn’t all the way true but I am as close to divorced as it is possible to be without holding a gun to a judge’s head and forcing him or her to sign the decree.”

She made a sound like a sob. “I thought you went back to your wife.”

He felt the astonishment at her words knew it must show on his face. “Go back to my wife? Why would I ever do that? After what we’ve had together? When I’m in love with you?”

She shook her head. Clung to his hands. He could see extra shine in her eyes where he though she was trying not to cry. “I went to your place. On Saturday. I took over coffee and your favorite muffins. I was going to talk to you. The cat was hanging around looking for you too, and then your neighbor came out and said you’d gone to LA. What else was I supposed to think?”

“That I was going to get divorced? How about that? I left school at three o’clock on Thursday and drove to LA. That’s a sixteen hour drive if you’re interested. I had a couple of hours of sleep and then met with my lawyer and we had a really wonderful time meeting with my ex-wife who is of course represented by my ex best friend.”

“That must have hurt.” In spite of herself he could see her need to make him feel better surfacing.

“It did hurt. But only because I realized how stupid I’d been ever to marry someone I didn’t really love. Maybe they’ll be happy together. I hope so.”

Her eyes widened. “You do?”

He grinned. “When I first found out they were together I hoped she’d gain four hundred pounds and his dick would fall off. But I’ve had some time away. And I met you. Now I try to be the bigger man and wish them well.”

“Very Zen master of you.”

He released her hands and pulled his copy of the settlement agreement out of his pocket. He flipped to the page where he and his ex had both signed it. “That’s the agreement. Iris, it’s done. All but some bureaucratic paperwork. My marriage is over.”

She glanced at the paperwork he pushed her way. Touched his signature with her fingertip. “You drove for thirty-two hours over three days.”

“I felt like you needed a grand gesture. I had to find a way to make you believe that I am never going back. I’m not on the rebound. This isn’t a transitional relationship. I don’t want to date and sleep with a bunch of women. I want you. I love you.”

“Oh, Geoff.”

“I admit the timing sucked. But when you meet the woman of your dreams, you don’t turn away from such luck.”

Her smile was sweet and warm. One of the first things he’d ever noticed about her. “I’m the woman of your dreams?”

He nodded. “What do you say? Will you take a chance and marry me?”

“You’ll marry me even if I’m pregnant?”

He lifted her hands, clasped them in his once more. “I will.”

She huffed a breath in and out and he felt her trying not to cry. Finally she said, “I never believed any man could love me this much. You know, in my life, I think somehow I got the feeling that I was never quite good enough. Oh, I was the woman that men told their troubles to, and leaned on in times of need. But I think I’ve always believed I have to be strong and hold it together. I can’t lean on anyone.”

“You can lean on me. I promise.”

She nodded slowly. “I think I can.”

He tugged on her hand. “Let’s get out of here.” When she rose he put an arm around her and said, close to her ear, “I need to kiss you very badly and I’m not doing it here.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

When they got outside, Geoff was as good as his word. He pulled her to him and kissed her so long and so hard that her legs started to feel weak.

When he pulled away she saw, finally saw, the love shining in his face. In the deepest part of her she knew everything was going to turn out right.

“There’s something I need to tell you,” she said, feeling so much joy she thought she might burst with it.

“You love me too?” He linked his hand with hers and they headed off in the opposite direction to the fertility clinic.

“I do love you,” she said, finally admitting the truth to him. “Oh, and it feels so good to say that out loud to you. I love you.” She had to stop as he pulled her to him once more and kissed her until she giggled and pulled away. “But there’s something else I need to tell you.”