“This woman, does she have a name?”
Flynn didn’t answer my question. “Cassie, just a few short hours ago we spent the night together on my mountain. I’ve never taken anyone to my land before, but I wanted you to see it, to experience it with me. As soon as I saw that land, I wanted it. I felt the same about you. As soon as I saw you, I wanted you too.”
I was startled into silence.
“I just wanted you to know that.” He turned to go.
“Is that it?” I said.
He turned back. “For now. I just want you to keep the door open to us, Cassie.”
“Why shouldn’t I close it? Flynn, we’ve only seen each other twice before. We spent the night on a mountaintop together, but there is no ‘us.’”
“Isn’t there? Like I said, Cassie, keep the door open. I’ve got some things to work out, but once I do, I’d like to see you again.”
“And you couldn’t wait until morning to tell me that?”
“No. I wanted you to know tonight. I didn’t want there to be any misunderstanding between us. How I felt the other night is how I feel now. I hope the same goes for you.” He stared at me in silence, said good night, then turned once again and went down the steps to the Mercedes. I watched him drive away.
CASSIE’S LOVE STORY
CHAPTER II
(1948–1949)
He had been born in Puerto Vallarta. His mother was of African descent, his father a native Indian. Soon after his birth his mother and father separated, and his father was no longer in his life. His mother had, in part, been influenced and educated by British colonialists in neighboring British Honduras, and therefore she named her children after them. There had been two other children, both boys, one older than Justine, one a few years younger. Both were now dead. A few years after Flynn was born, his mother returned to her native British Honduras and took both Flynn and Justine with her. When Flynn was eight, his mother died and Justine, who was sixteen, basically raised him. There were only the two of them left. When he was ten, Justine went to the United States, leaving him behind with a family in Mexico, the Peñas. When he was fifteen, Justine sent for him. Soon after, the Peñas migrated to the United States as well. In 1943, at age twenty, he was inducted into the United States Army even though he was not yet a citizen, but a resident alien. He served on the European front and was at the invasion of Normandy. While with the Peñas in Mexico, he had apprenticed as a carpenter, and upon his return from the war, he started working construction. He had hopes of designing buildings of his own one day and of building his own house on the mountain land. That was what I knew about him. It wasn’t all that much, but for me it was enough. I didn’t need to know anything else.
I already was in love with him.
* * *
◆ ◆ ◆
The days following my midnight meeting with Flynn, Flynn did not call. He did not call the following week either or come to see me, and I got on with my life. With the help of Mrs. Hendersen, I got a job selling tickets at the Lincoln Theater. She knew the manager. It was a decent-paying job and it was a fabulous one. Sometimes, too, I served as an usherette. The Lincoln Theater, one of several theaters on Central Avenue, was a Negro theater showing the most recent movies as well as showcasing live performances by some of the biggest Negro stars, like Duke Ellington and Billie Holiday and Nat King Cole. It also presented talent shows. Moorish in architectural style, the building had fascinated Flynn and he had pointed it out to me during our first walk together. I loved working there. My hours were mostly during the day, but sometimes I was called to work evenings as well, and when I was, I kept wondering if Flynn would come walking into the theater. I couldn’t get him off my mind. I had been with him only three times, but thoughts of him ruled my days and my nights. I could not forget the words he had said to me. I also could not forget the woman clinging to his life, and that he was not ready to let go of her.
In some ways, I felt myself no match for this woman. I was a country girl and saw myself as that, pretty enough, I knew, but certainly no match for a woman schooled in the ways of men. I knew nothing about men in that way. As confident as I was most times, I had never slept with a man and was often unsure about my own feelings. What I was sure about was that I had strong feelings for Flynn, but despite what Flynn had said to me, I wasn’t sure about his feelings for me. I wanted to see him again. I wanted to be near him again, to touch him again. I wanted him to kiss me again, hold me again. I could not let go of this feeling I had for him. In mid-March, Flynn unexpectedly reached out to me once more. He called. “You get your life straightened out yet?” I asked.
“I’d like to talk to you about that later, if you’ll see me,” he said. “You mentioned you like fishing. I know a great spot.”
I agreed to go fishing. It was before dawn on a Saturday morning when Flynn came for me. He took me to the pier. There we climbed into a rowboat and Flynn handed me a fishing rod, already baited. “Can you swim?” he asked.
“Not very well. Used to wade a little in the Rosa Lee.” His look was questioning. “Creek near our place back home,” I explained. “Used to fish there too.”
Flynn rowed the boat, leaving the rod in my hands. As the morning sunlight began to settle on the water, he stopped rowing. “You thought about what I said that last night we talked?”
“Is your friend still in your life?”
“Her name’s Faye,” he volunteered. “She’s still a friend. Does that make a difference?”
“Why should it? I figure a person can have more than one friend.”
He was quiet a moment, then said, “She won’t be in my life forever, Cassie. She came into it when I really needed someone, right after the war. There were other women, but she was closest to me and sometimes it’s hard for a person to let go.”
“I have no holds on you, Flynn.” I was trying to be sophisticated about his relationship with this woman, Faye. “You go out with whom you want and so do I. One thing you need to know though, I’m not sleeping with you—”
Flynn laughed. “Did I ask you to?” I looked away. No longer laughing, Flynn gently ran his forefinger down the side of my face. “Doesn’t matter, at least not right now.”
I looked at the water, then back at him. “Is that good or bad for us?”
“You’re special to me, Cassie, and it’s more than your body I want.”
“Well, what else do you want?”
“Give it time,” Flynn said. “You’ll find out.”
After that, Flynn began seeing and calling me more often. That night we went to a movie and to dinner afterward. The next weekend we drove down to Tijuana for the day. The weekend following, we drove up the coast. What was left of the Los Angeles winter passed into a Los Angeles spring, hardly different from the Los Angeles winter, and then came the summer and we continued seeing each other. We took long walks along the beach. We went to his land, and we talked. We talked and talked about many things. We also spent a lot of time on Central Avenue. There was always something going on there. Not only did we spend some of our weekend nights at the jazz clubs, we looked for bargains at the record shops, went to the restaurants and, of course, to the theaters. We were even on the Avenue when Joe Louis, the Brown Bomber, fought Jersey Joe Walcott.