Bravo Unwrapped

by Christine Rimmer

  Buck grinned at the sight. “Hey. That’s right. Tomorrow night’s Halloween.”

  “The thrill of it all,” B.J. grumbled and watched in envy as Lupe went on up the stairs without having to ask Buck for permission.

  “Lighten up,” Buck instructed. “When are you carving the pumpkins, Ma?”

  “After lunch.”

  “B.J. and I will help.”

  Speak for yourself, she thought, but didn’t say. “I’m going upstairs for a minute or two—if that’s all right with you?” My lord, my master, my least favorite tour guide…

  He gave her a wave, turned his back on her and started digging through the open cardboard box of decorations. “Will you look at this?” He held up a black coffee mug with a white cobweb painted on it.

  His mother, still at the front window, glanced over her shoulder and murmured fondly, “My Halloween mug.”

  Buck dug around in the box again. “And this…”

  B.J. didn’t stay to see what other touching memento of days gone by he’d discovered, but fled before he could change his mind and call her back.

  Upstairs, the door to her room stood open, a maid’s cart in front of it. Oh, great. Five minutes to herself and nowhere private to go.

  But how long did it take to pick up a room? Maybe Glory was almost done. B.J. slid between the door and the maid’s cart and poked her head in.

  Glory sat on the bed, shoulders slumped, shining brown head hung low. The bed was made. A quick glance around the room told B.J. that the room was clean and ready for her use.

  Well, except that the maid was still in it.

  B.J. cleared her throat. Glory started and looked up. “Oh!”

  “All finished?”

  “Uh. Yeah…yeah, I am. I, uh…” She hung her head again, clearly lost and feeling miserable.

  B.J. looked at her pretty down-turned profile, and sympathy—all warm and gooey and totally unacceptable—welled up inside her. Not smart, ever, to get involved in the problems of the help.

  Still, B.J. did understand exactly what the girl was going through. After all, B.J., too, was pregnant and planning to go it on her own.

  Pregnant by a Bravo, just like Glory.

  Since it wasn’t the same Bravo, that probably didn’t amount to any real connection between the two of them. Still, for some strange reason, it felt as if it did.

  Against her better judgment, B.J. entered the room, shut the door and went to sit beside Glory on the bed. B.J.’s arm, pretty much of its own accord, reached out and gathered the girl close. With a heavy sigh, Glory leaned her dark head on B.J.’s shoulder.

  B.J. realized it felt…kind of good. Just to sit there, to feel the other woman’s warmth at her side. Kind of friendly. Companionable. Something, for once, without aloneness in it. Without aloneness and also without desire.

  For most of her life, B.J. had felt alone. It wasn’t a bad feeling, really, and it went hand-in-hand with self-reliance and inner strength, two qualities B.J. was proud to claim. Yes, sometimes, more than alone, she felt lonely, which wasn’t so great. But she bore her loneliness without complaining, as she’d been brought up to do.

  During her time with Buck—that incredible, magical six months, six years ago—she had not felt alone. But there had been desire, then. Desire that was hot and wild and insistent and a world away from right now, sitting here, with Glory Dellazola. Now, the lack of aloneness had a peaceful, restful kind of quality about it.

  Very odd.

  B.J. looked at the vulnerable crown of Glory’s head and wondered at herself. Why, this was kind of a…bondy moment, wasn’t it?

  She’d never been the type to get bondy with other women. It wasn’t that she didn’t like other women. Women were fine. But she simply had no talent for the ways with which they communicated with each other.

  B.J.’s mother had died when she was two. L.T. had never remarried. Instead of a wife, he’d had his Alpha Girls. An endless, stunning string of them. The kindhearted ones—and the ones who’d hoped in vain to get L.T.’s ring on their fingers—would try to take L.T.’s little girl under their wings.

  Wings.

  Yes.

  Birds…

  That was, really, how B.J. saw other women and their complex, cooing, flighty ways of relating to each other. Other women were like birds—another species altogether. B.J. didn’t really get them, didn’t understand what made them tick.

  Not that she understood men, either. But then, she wasn’t a man, so no one expected her to fully comprehend them.

  Glory looked up at her. “What’s that perfume you’re wearing?”

  “I have it made.”

  “Perfume made just for you?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I love it.”

  “Well, thanks.”

  “And your shoes—yeah, it’s true. I peeked at your shoes. That’s kind of disgusting, huh?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  Glory sighed. “Your shoes are incredible.”

  “I’m flattered you like them.”

  “You’re rich, aren’t you?” Glory didn’t wait for an answer. She laid her head back on B.J.’s shoulder and went on talking. “I’d like that. To be rich. To be one-hundred-percent totally in charge of my own life. To do what I want when I want and never worry about how I was going to pay for it. To go to college… You went to college, right?” Glory paused long enough for B.J. to make a sound in the affirmative. “And you have a great job at a big-time magazine and an apartment in New York City….” It was a high-floor, corner two-bedroom, one-and-a-half-bath, on lower Fifth Avenue in a top prewar full-service building, to be specific. But B.J. saw no reason to rub it in or anything. Glory lifted her head again and met B.J.’s eyes. “Bowie told my father that I’m pregnant.”

  “Oh, no.”

  “Yeah. He couldn’t get me to say yes, so he told my Dad so that my Dad would get me to say yes. I’m furious at Bowie for that.”

  “And well you should be.”

  “He had no right….”

  “I so agree.”

  “My Dad told my Mom. And my Mom told my sisters and my sisters told…just about everyone else. And now the whole town knows and everyone in my family is after me, to do like Bowie says and marry him.”

  B.J. rubbed Glory’s shoulder and suggested gently, “I kind of gathered, from what you said the other day, that you knew this would happen.”

  “Yeah. I did. And I knew I’d hate it, too. And I do. My great-grandpa Tony thinks I’m a slut.”

  The old guy on the bench? How could he? Outraged, B.J. demanded, “He called you that?”

  “No. He didn’t have to. I could see it in his eyes. I can see it everyone’s eyes.”

  “Not mine.”

  A sad little giggle escaped Glory. “Well, no. But you’re from New York City. They do things differently there—plus, you’re not Catholic, are you?”

  “Well, no…”

  “I am. So’s my whole family. You know how Catholics are, don’t you?”

  B.J. had a pretty good idea. “No birth control. No abortions. Abstinence. Priests.”

  “Yeah. All that. And all that means that when you’re a Catholic, you’re supposed to get married before you get pregnant. But if you do get pregnant first, you should get married as soon as possible—to the father of your baby, if you can. And then, once you’ve married him, you’re supposed to stay married, forever. Like a life sentence—which is fine, as long as you’re smart enough to pick the right person to be sentenced with.”

  “You don’t think Bowie’s the right person?”

  “Well, he does feel like the right person…”

  “Meaning you love him.”

  “Yeah. But, well, love is great and all that. But I have older sisters, you know?”

  “You mentioned that, yes.”

  “Six of them. And two brothers. Nine of us altogether—but back to my sisters. The oldest is Trista. The second-oldest is Clarice. Trista’s thi
rty now and Clarice is twenty-eight. When they were about my age—which is twenty—they married wild guys like Bowie. It was love and passion and forever and all that. Tris and Risi are both still married. Also, they’re miserable. Tris has three kids and Risi has two. Their husbands stay out all night and neither one of those guys has a job at this particular moment. Maybe I don’t have a college education, but I can add two and two and come up with four, if you know what I mean. A leopard doesn’t change its spots—and a wild guy with no job? Well, when all the hot passion and heavy breathing wears off, that guy is wild as ever and most likely still unemployed.”

  B.J. agreed with her. But she didn’t say so. No reason to belabor what was already crystal clear—and Glory was looking at her strangely. “What?”

  “Are you in love with Buck?”

  Ouch. Direct hit. “No.”

  Glory leaned closer. “You hesitated. I saw you.”

  B.J. hardly knew what to say. She sputtered out, “Uh. Buck and I have…history. And issues.”

  “That sounds bad.”

  “I can’t believe I’m talking to you about this.”

  Glory giggled. “You’re not. Not much, anyway. I’m the one doing all the talking. I think the world of Buck.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Yeah. Buck’s pretty special. He’s kind of the exception that proves the rule, if you think about it. I mean, he was crazy-wild as a kid. Do you know that the night of his high-school graduation, he got drunk and went skinny-dipping under the Logan Bridge? That’s the bridge behind the Pizza Parlor. He got hungry after his swim, so he went on up to the Pizza Parlor—without bothering to put his clothes back on first.”

  Now, there was an image. Buck in the Pizza Parlor, naked and soaking wet, ordering himself a slice and a jumbo soft drink to go with it. “No, he never mentioned that.”

  “There’s lots of wild things he did, before he headed off to Texas, supposedly to work in the oil fields. No one believed he was actually going to work—in the oil fields or anywhere else—when he left town. Because while he was here, he never could hold a job. He couldn’t even get one by the time he left. No one would hire him after he almost burned down the grocery store taking a smoke break in the back.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “I’m not. He never told you?”

  “No.”

  “He was so hopeless. But so cute, you know, like all the Bravo boys? So…sexy, in that dangerous, what-will-he-do-next kind of way. Half the girls in town had a crush on him. And then, when he left, no one ever expected he’d amount to anything. But look at him now. He’s pretty famous, isn’t he?”

  “Yes, he is.”

  “And he lives in New York City and writes stuff for good money. He’s written a whole book, even. It’s not a regular job—but it is a job. Sometimes, when I think of Buck, it gives me hope that Bowie might change, after all. You know?”

  B.J. said softly, “Yeah. I can see that.”

  Glory hung her head again and heaved a gusty sigh. “Well, I should probably get back to work, I guess….”

  “You sure you’re all right?”

  “Yeah. As all right as I can be, considering I’m a pregnant unmarried Catholic with a hopeless unemployed wild man for a boyfriend and I live in a small town where everyone spends all their free time gossiping about everyone else.” Glory stood and turned to look down at B.J. “Thanks for listening….”

  “Anytime.” Had she actually said that?

  “It’s good…to have someone to talk to, sometimes. Someone not involved in your problem in any way. You know?”

  B.J. imagined it would be good. Maybe. She nodded.

  Glory beamed, all dimples and shining amber-brown eyes. “Well. Okay. Back to work.” And she turned and left B.J. sitting alone on the bed, marveling.

  No doubt about it now. B.J. had just done the bondy thing with another woman. It hadn’t been half bad, either—and she’d learned a thing or two about Buck.

  Not that it really mattered, what she learned about Buck. Uh-uh. What she’d learned about Buck didn’t matter.

  Not in the least…

  Eight

  That afternoon, out on the enclosed back porch, Buck, Chastity, Glory and B.J. carved pumpkins. Twenty of them. Enough to line either side of the slate walk out front, from the white picket fence up the steps to the front door.

  Bowie showed up not long after the carving began and pitched in, too. Lupe made herself scarce for the event. Lucky Lupe. She was there to shoot a Christmas feature. For Halloween and pumpkin-carving, her presence was not required.

  B.J. didn’t need to be there, either. Except that her only job for the next two weeks was to be where Buck wanted her, when he wanted her there. Buck wanted her on the back porch carving pumpkins—and so, here she was.

  How could this have happened?

  The night before, when she’d agreed to his terms, she hadn’t truly realized the extent to which he would get to run her life. Oh, she could so easily become bitter….

  Then again, B.J. thought, as she bravely dug her bare hand into the seedy, slimy center of her second pumpkin of the afternoon, the situation could be worse. With five people slaving away at the task, it would only take a couple of hours.

  And Buck looked so happy. He reminisced as he hacked away at one hapless jack-o’-lantern after another. It was, “Remember the year we…” and “I’ll never forget that time when…”

  B.J. found herself watching him, feeling something that could only be called fondness. And then he would look up and meet her eyes. They would share a smile….

  Okay, all right. This was risky behavior. He could get the wrong idea altogether.

  But then she would picture him—a wild teenager, naked in the Pizza Parlor, drunk as the proverbial skunk. And she’d wonder why he’d never told her about that when they were lovers, wonder why he’d never told her what a wild kid he’d been….

  And then Glory would catch her eye and give her the smile of a true co-conspirator. B.J. would grin back, warm all over with that new sensation of woman-to-woman bondy-ness.

  It was nice. A good time.

  Well, except for Bowie. The guy had a terminal case of the sulks. And he didn’t seem to care much for Glory and B.J. sharing looks. The first time they grinned at each other, he scowled—B.J. saw him do it out of the corner of her eye. The second time, he grunted. A disgusted sound.

  The third time, Bowie threw down his carving knife—splat—into a mound of fresh-scooped pumpkin guts. “Okay, Glory. What the hell’s going on? You won’t give me the time of day, but all of a sudden you and Buck’s girl are best friends?”

  “What?” Glory stabbed her knife into the side of her pumpkin. It quivered there and then went still. “Now, you don’t want me to have any friends?”

  “Ahem,” B.J. ventured gingerly, thinking she really ought to clarify. “I am not Buck’s girl.”

  “She might be, soon, though,” Buck put in, teasingly.

  B.J. opened her mouth to set Buck straight, but before she could get the words out, Bowie started shouting. “Stay out of this, Miss New York Frickin’ City. It’s got nothin’ to do with you.”

  “Hey!” cried Chastity.

  “Bowie.” Buck wasn’t teasing now. “Cut that out.”

  Glory waded in, brown eyes blazing. “Yeah. You leave her alone, you big jerk.”

  Bowie lunged to his feet and loomed over Glory. “Oh, so now I’m a jerk, am I?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, you are. A big, mean, sulky, blabber-mouthed, unemployed jerk.”

  “Why, you little—”

  “Bowie!” Buck and Chastity shouted in unison.

  That shut Bowie up—for a second or two, during which he fisted his hands at his sides, stepped back and then forward, as if he didn’t quite know what to do with himself. At last he spoke again, more quietly this time. “I did the right thing. You know I did.”

  “Wrong,” cried Glory. “Wrong, wrong, wrong.”

  “E
verybody was going to know eventually, anyway.”

  “That’s no excuse and you know it’s not.”

  “Why won’t you just—?”

  She waved him off with a pumpkin-gooey hand. “Leave me alone. I mean it. I’m through with you.”

  “But you can’t—”

  “Yeah, I can. Just you watch me.”

  “How can you—?”

  “I’ll say it again. I’ll say it a hundred times. I’m through with you, Bowie. Just leave me alone.”

  Bowie stared down at her. He looked sick. B.J. almost felt sorry for him. Finally, he growled, “Carve the damn pumpkins yourself,” and stormed out the porch door.

  Everybody winced as he slammed it behind him. He pounded down the back steps.

  “Where’s he going?” B.J. asked, once the porch stopped shaking.

  “Don’t know,” Glory muttered. “But one thing I’m sure of. He’s not going to work—being as how he doesn’t have a job.”

  “Ah,” B.J. said, for lack of anything better. She concentrated on her pumpkin again.

  An uneasy silence reigned until Chastity said gently, “You shouldn’t get him going.”

  “I know.” Glory yanked the knife out of her pumpkin. It made a hollow, sucking sound as it came free. “But I’ve had it with him. Look at how he behaves—and you know what he did.”

  “I know, I know.” Chastity was shaking her head.

  “I don’t,” said Buck, frowning in puzzlement. “What did he do?” Chastity and Glory both stared at him—and then at each other. Neither replied. Buck prompted, “Well?”

  Chastity said, “Why don’t we just let it go for now?”

  Glory leaned closer to Buck and whispered, “Ask B.J. later. She knows all about it.”

  Once they’d finished with the pumpkins and cleaned up the mess they’d made, Buck decided to get B.J. out of there.

  “Come on,” he said. “We’re going for a ride.”

  She gave him a look that brimmed with suspicion. “Isn’t that what they say in the Mafia? Then they drive you to a deserted cornfield, strangle you and stick a dead canary in your mouth.”