Water Signs: A Story of Love and Renewal

* * *

"Wow Madeline," he whispered aloud, to no one in particular. "You

really know how to make a grown man weep." As he lingered in his

parents' kitchen, he pored over every sentence, every sentiment

repeatedly, as if needing unequivocal reassurance this was indeed real and

not just some fabrication of a restless soul, longing for its twin flame.

He stared out the window as the fronds of a coconut palm gracefully

danced in the gentle breeze. He thought back to a day nearly fourteen

years earlier, when a young Madeline had walked into his real estate office,

impeccably dressed in a peach linen suit. She'd been fresh off a flight

from Atlantic City to Fort Lauderdale, to meet with a prospective

employer, in anticipation of her impending move to Pompano Beach a

few weeks later. Family friends who'd lived there had offered her

temporary shelter, until she'd gotten her bearings and found an apartment

in a safe area.

During the multitude of phone conversations that had preceded this

particular visit, Ken had struggled in vain to find the words to tell her he'd

been living with another woman-one whom he'd been excited to marry.

That is, until Madeline shocked the hell out of him. He never in a million

years expected such an abrupt turnaround; for more than twelve months,

she'd consistently rejected his pleas to join him in the Sunshine State.

Now, with one 180-degree turn, she'd rocked his entire world.

But it was too late. And while he acknowledged at the deepest level

that marrying Erin might possibly be the biggest mistake of his life, he just

couldn't abandon her. After all, when he left New Jersey to pursue his

dreams, they'd both felt the intense pain of separation. Yet Erin actively

sought to remedy the situation by diligently working with a head hunter to

secure a good position in Miami. Unlike Maddy, she'd placed no

geographical restrictions on love.

Unfortunately, their live-in arrangement soon revealed significant

differences-impediments that Ken hoped would either dissolve entirely,

or at least mitigate once they were united in the bonds of marriage. In

hindsight of course, he'd realized the folly of his thinking. That while he

truly did love Erin, it had been utterly foolish to believe they could

actually go the distance with her relentless insecurities, self-centeredness

and proclivity towards distrust inflicting slow, steady and ultimately-

unfixable, damage to their union.

Every female, whether Ken's boss, co-worker or fellow college

student, provoked Erin's pervasive jealousy. On more than one occasion

he recalled knock-down, drag-out arguments with her over innocuous

incidents, from a study session in broad daylight over coffee at Starbucks,

to mandatory after-hours socializing with the sales and operations teams

at a company-sponsored event.

A respectful guy by nature, Ken despised fighting with his wife,

particularly when the altercations had no basis in reality. Oftentimes, he'd

simply retreat to the golf course or the beach when things deteriorated at

home. And once they'd had both children, prompting Erin to set up her

own business out of the spare bedroom, Ken found himself even less

eager to engage her unfounded accusations. He didn't want his innocent

kids to suffer the consequences of their parents ill-advised decision to tie

the knot, so he took great pains to avoid raising his voice around their

mother-an effort that demanded a tremendous amount of restraint.

Then there was the negative influence of the Boca Raton culture.

While an exceedingly beautiful city and desirable place to live, Boca's

downside was the extreme superficiality of many of its residents, some of

whom held positions of power within the community, from the local

paper's society page writer to the plethora of ambitious millionaires that

populated upscale neighborhoods like Broken Sound, Royal Palm and the

Sanctuary. While Ken envied no one, content to focus on his own goals,

Erin got caught up in the web of botox, breast enhancements and

liposuction that characterized the activities of the city's wealthiest females.

And as her business thrived, so did her vanity, leading her to undergo

a seemingly endless parade of plastic surgeries, all to assuage her fears of

growing older and help her keep pace with the women with whom she

networked for both business and social purposes. After almost thirteen

years of marriage, Ken didn't even recognize her-or was it perhaps more

accurate to say that he was just beginning to?

Looking back down at Madeline's delicate handwriting, he re-read her

line about how no man before or after him had ever treated her with the

same amount of respect, affection and concern. These words both thrilled

and saddened him. On the one hand, he sensed a golden opportunity to

rectify the mistakes of the past; on the other, it pained him that someone

as wonderful as Madeline Rose had failed to find the true love and

commitment she so richly deserved. What was wrong with some of these guys

anyway? Didn't they recognize quality when they saw it?

Ken folded the writing paper back into the note card before sliding it

into the envelope. To think, just a few hours ago, he'd left her a message

assuming her letter had been nothing more than a birthday greeting.

Somehow, Madeline always did find a way to surprise him. Flipping open

his cell phone, Ken checked the time and realized Brian's baseball practice

was about to end. He raced out of the front door and into his white Lexus

sedan. And as he drove past the flowering yellow trees that adorned the

traffic islands separating eastbound and westbound traffic on Palmetto

Park Road, for the first time in an eternity, he began to feel alive again.