A Love Song for Ricki Wilde (97)

Ricki turned ashen. Ezra, still silent, grasped her hand. She held on for dear life, her knuckles turning white.

“I’ve been ailing since 2016. It comes and goes. But this time’ll be the last time, let the doctors tell it.” She delivered this news matter-of-factly. “But don’t you worry. We all die of something, and my life has been good. I’m happy. I’m not scared of dying—I’m actually curious about it. Besides, life sits shoulder to shoulder with death. It’s around us all the time.

“Lately, I’ve been receiving visitors in my dreams. People I’ve known and loved that’ve passed on. They’re the sweetest, most welcoming dreams. Oftentimes, I even wake up disappointed to be awake. I just want to go with them, as silly as it sounds. But maybe that’s the idea. Our people visit us when it’s time to go, to help us transition and not to be afraid of death. And I’m not. The one thing that bothered me was that I’d seen everyone but my Dr. Bennett. My beloved.”

Her voice cracked on “beloved,” but she moved on. Della had barely said two words in the past couple of days, and now she couldn’t stop. Held rapt, Ricki and Ezra sat across from her—Ricki stricken, and Ezra solemn—and they didn’t try to interject. So she kept going.

“Last night, he finally came to me. Handsome as the devil, in his fedora and oxfords, and his tickled smile, the one so big his eyes disappear. Oh, I liked to pass out from relief. And, without saying it, I knew wherever I am going next, I’ll be safe with him. I’m lucky to have love like that. Some people don’t, you know. Some people go before they’re loved correctly, or even at all.” She looked Ezra in the eye, a piercing yet kind look. “Do you love Ricki?”

Ezra drew up a little taller in his seat. “Yes, ma’am.”

“With your eyes or your heart?”

“With everything.” Squeezing Ricki’s hand, he held Della’s impenetrable gaze. “For a long time, I thought I knew what my calling was. My grand purpose. But when I met Ricki, I knew I was wrong. I was a fool, thinking that I was born to do anything grander than loving her.”

They heard a sniffle, and all three turned their heads. Naaz stood in the archway, tears streaming down her face.

“Naaz, if you don’t find some business!”

The nurse waved and, patting her eyes with a Kleenex, headed back down the hall.

“If you love her, why did you tell her this malarkey about a curse? Immortality? My mother, Felice?”

“Because it’s true,” confessed Ezra quietly.

Della’s eyes narrowed. She was testing him. “Did you love my mother? Answer fast, now. Don’t think up a lie.”

“No,” he said, his voice low. “I didn’t. I couldn’t love at that point in my life. I was full of grief, I was turned around and lost. It looked like I had it all, but I was dulled by all the loss. And Felice… Being with Felice pulled me out of it. She was bright and unafraid, and her strength was contagious. Her energy was intoxicating at times, but I didn’t love her, and she knew it. Her death was my fault. I accept full responsibility. She wanted me to come back with her to Louisiana, and I couldn’t. I wasn’t who she needed me to be.”

Della studied Ezra, unsure if she could trust him. She trusted Ricki, but who would have thought in the final chapter of her life, she’d be called to believe something so outlandish? Here she was, staring into the very young eyes of a man who’d apparently known her mother, the only person who’d ever given her real details about Felice. She had to be sure he wasn’t just insane or delusional. She wanted to do her mother justice.

“Did you make her think you were in love with her?”

He paused, in thought for a long time. After a few moments, he said quietly, “Yes, I suppose I did.”

“’Cause you liked feeling needed, I reckon?”

His mouth twitched. Ezra looked ashamed. He looked exposed, yanked out of his hiding place.

“Thing is, men stay thinking that women are the supporting characters in their story. Ever think you were just a character in hers? I suppose she just wanted a family, a father for her daughter, a man to legitimize her. Not saying she was right to want those things from you, but you were the man who let her down, on the wrong day.”

“So… you believe him?” Ricki asked.

“I didn’t say that,” Della said haughtily. “I’m speaking in hypotheticals.”

“I brought something for you.” Ezra took an envelope out of his coat pocket. Rising up from the love seat, he handed it to Della.

Steadying her hands, her heart beating fast, she opened the envelope and unearthed a small, delicate, and yellowing photograph. It was an almost totally faded picture of a girl covering her breasts and sitting with her legs crossed on the stump of a tree. She was barely visible under the shadow of a moss-hung oak. Her hair rippled in chin-length waves. Her eyes were wide-set, round, yearning. She looked heartbreakingly young.

“When Felice was dancing at Eden Lounge, one of the chorus girls somehow got ahold of this photograph. She’d taken it when she was younger, back in your hometown. The dancer passed it around, and Felice was ashamed about it. So I bought the photo from the dancer. This was the only copy. I tracked down the photographer and bought the film. I wanted to help her. I just… wanted to help her. One of the last things she said to me was how much she missed you and she loved you. And wanted to be with you.”