Neither of them spoke for several long minutes. She could hear the bubbling of the fountain from the cave echoing through the pristine stillness of the cooling room. The rhythmic sound soothed, and Leo’s deltoids went practically pliant beneath her fingertips.
When he finally spoke, his voice sounded even deeper than normal and heartbreakingly hollow. “I don’t talk about my childhood because I didn’t have one. Not in the normal sense of the word.”
Mattie’s heart shuddered like a stalled-out engine, but somehow she managed to keep on massaging his back without faltering. He needed her to stay the course and keep them both steady.
“I... I think I have some memories of my mother, but they’re like an old, cracked, and overexposed tintype. Not very clear. The head administrator at the orphanage, Mr.Knight, said that both my parents were drunkards. When my mother tired of me, she dropped me off on the doorstep of the foundling home. She wouldn’t even give her last name, so Mr.Knight just used Ward for mine.”
“Is that why you never drink alcohol?” Mattie asked the easier question, the less personal one, the least painful.
“We were taught at the orphanage that it was worse than the devil’s brew and that most of us were there because of its ruinous properties. I never wanted to be like my parents—choosing liquor over family. Seemed like it was best if I avoided something with power like that.”
“You could never be like them, Leo.” Mattie pressed a kiss to his shoulder as she worked his lower back. His eyes squeezed shut at the contact, and she noticed that his hands clenched the cushions so hard that the fabric and stuffing both bunched up.
“It was cold there,” Leo said. “Everything about it was cold. The cracked walls. The rotten windowpanes. The lessons. The food. The people in charge of us boys. But in the summer, we sweltered. And we never lived up to Mr.Knight’s standards. He had a veneer of morality that he donned when the donors or the trustees visited, and he imposed so many exacting standards that we could never hope to meet. When I got older, I tried to protect the younger ones from his punishments. But finally I couldn’t endure it any longer. I left when I had the chance. I never went back. I shoved it all from my mind.”
Mattie’s heart ached, and she longed to embrace him. But she didn’t want to upset the delicate balance they’d found. It was as if the consistent pressure of her hands and fingers somehow steadied him. She’d waited for years to hear Leo’s story, and now that he had begun to tell it, she needed to listen.
“The streets were freezing, too, but I found a degree of peace as long as I kept to myself. I scrounged, wangled odd jobs, scraped by. When I got older, I left New York and traveled west, picking up work here and there until your father hired me to help out around the flight school.”
And he still kept to himself,Mattie thought. But she didn’t say those words aloud. Didn’t want to hurt Leo or for him to think she judged him. She remembered, though, all the moments when he would stand off to the side observing the family but never really participating. He was a master at keeping his distance, but she’d never stopped to reallycontemplate why. She should’ve. Leo would’ve. Quiet, observant Leo, who’d learned to be that way to survive.
“Even when you frustrated me by trying to curb my flying, I’ve always admired you,” Mattie admitted. “You have such quiet strength. I’ve told you before, Leo, that you’re solid. And now... now I find myself in a bit of awe over you.”
Leo shifted, one shoulder rising, then the other. Clearly, she’d made him uncomfortable, but that didn’t mean that what she had said hadn’t needed to be verbalized.
“I admire you too, Mattie. You’re all brightness, passion, and fearlessness.”
After all these years at odds with Leo, it felt good, so good, for him to acknowledge her like that.
“You’re an incredibly decent man, Leo Ward. You’ve made something of yourself when the world gave you nothing to build with. And you did it honestly. Thank you, Leo, for sharing your past with me. I know it wasn’t easy, but it meant a lot to me to hear it.”
“It meant a lot to me to say it,” he admitted gruffly. “Someday, I’ll tell you more.”
“Whenever you’re ready, I’ll listen.” She kissed the part of his spine between his shoulders. She knew Leo had left much unsaid. Some she could fill in; other parts she could only imagine. But in time, he would tell her at his own pace. Mattie was accustomed to flying toward every obstacle with an open throttle, but Leo wasn’t like that. His revelations were not hers to control buthisto share.
Leo shifted then, and she sensed he wanted to rise. She eased back and slipped to one side of the bench. When he sat up, she plopped down beside him. He gathered her against his side and wrapped one of his strong, capable arms around her. She leaned against his shoulder and listened to him breathe, slow and steady. He sounded contented, and she realized how simplyrightthis moment felt.
Years ago, they had been good friends. Even when they had been at odds, there’d been some vestiges of that old connection. Now they were sweethearts.
And this evening, away from both flying circuses, their relationship had deepened even more. It had developed into companionship.
It felt strong to Mattie. Durable.
But then again, so had their old comradery before it had fractured. And what did she desire from their connection? Why did she have such trouble imagining what she wanted in the future?
Chapter Fifteen
In a world-gone-mad moment, Rockol has made the dubious decision of replacing its spokesperson Mr.Earl “Quick” Crenshaw with a ladybird flyer. Previously known only for her relationship with Mr.Leo “the Flying Lion” Ward and her membership in Vera Jones’s attempt at a flying circus, Miss Mattie McAdams is an odd choice. Perhaps Rockol thinks scandal will sell more motor oil than good old-fashioned flying.
—Benjamin Pringle,Chicago Advance Leader
“We’re not holding up the test of your device, are we?” Guadalupe Espinosa-Diaz, Aida’s mother, asked as she and her husband, Amando Sanchez-Teneiya, hurried out from the U-shaped courtyard in the center of their sprawling white-stucco hacienda. The two had become fascinated with Mattie’s RadioNavigator during dinner last night. The Flying Flappers were beginning a series of shows that Vera had scheduled down the California coast, and the Sanchez family had invited them all to stay in their luxurious compound for a few days. Aida’s parents had welcomed their daughter’s friends with a meal featuring much of their own produce, from figs to almonds.
“Not at all,” Mattie called back. “We’re still just getting set up.”
“Bien,” Amando said. “My business call with the canning company went longer than expected, and I was afraid I had delayed things.”
“Goodness no,” Vera said. “It always takes us forever to get our troupe moving, and you’re right on time.”
