“I’m glad they do,” Russell had answered, meaning every word. Barbara deserved flowers tonight. He would have rented a car and driven to Boston if he hadn’t been able to find some in Ogunquit.
When he reached the B&B, Russell quietly eased the front door open, his eyes darting toward the empty parlor. Seizing the moment, he stepped inside the foyer, closed the door, then made a beeline for the stairway.
He didn’t get far, for Cleta’s Doppler radar was on full sweep. From the kitchen, she yelled, “That you, Russell?”
“It’s me, Mom Lansdown.” His mood sank. A few minutes alone with his wife—was that too much to ask?
Cleta kept the bulletins coming. “Supper’s nearly on the table—we have cod tonight!”
Cod was his least favorite anything.
Russell took the stairs two at a time, dimly aware that water was sloshing out of the vase and dampening his sleeve.
Cleta poked her head around the kitchen doorway, catching him on the landing. “You feeling all right today?”
“Fine, Mom Lansdown. Just fine.”
“Flowers!” Cleta smiled. “How nice. You should bring ’em down here, though, let me put them in some fresh water.”
“They’re fine!” he called, tamping his rising irritation.
As the carnations gyrated wildly, he hurried down the hallway, then thrust the bouquet behind his back and flung open the door to his bedroom. Barbara sat straight up from the bed, her eyes wide. The theme from Gilligan’s Island played from the little television on the bookshelf.
Closing the door with his foot, he walked to the bed, grinning foolishly.
“Hi, honey.” Barbara—and boy, did she look good with that haircut—gave him a sweet smile. “You scared me coming into the room that way.” She laid her journal aside.
“Sorry.” He sat down on the side of the bed, still trying to conceal the flowers. Barbara leaned in for a long kiss. The embrace lasted longer than he expected, so Russell had to pull away because his hand cramped from holding the heavy vase. Barbara didn’t seem to notice.
His eyes focused on the black book. “Writing in your journal again?”
“Ayuh.”
“Yours or the one your mom reads?”
She wrapped her arms around her knees. “Mine.”
He grinned. “Don’t you think it’s deceitful to keep two journals?”
Barbara laughed. “Not at all! One’s private, the other’s for the grapevine. Mom’s happy thinking she knows everything going on in my life, and I get to keep my thoughts to myself. It’s a great compromise.”
Barbara’s beautiful eyes focused on his arm. “Is it sleeting outside? Your sleeve is wet.”
“No, not sleeting.” He brought the vase forward, smiling when his wife squealed with delight.
“For me?”
“For the most beautiful girl in the world.”
She threw her arms around his neck and showered him with kisses while he laughed and held the flowers out of the melee. When she finally settled down, he set the flowers on the bedside table, then he stretched out on the blue and green bedspread.
“Pink,” Barbara said, sniffing at the carnations. “My favorite color. Why, Russell, these must have cost you a fortune!”
“Not really, but what if they did? You’re worth every penny.”
Teasingly, she stretched out beside him and brushed her lips against his ear, whispering, “What have you done?”
“Nothing.”
“Then what have I done to deserve flowers?” She pulled back, her gaze meeting his. “You’re the one about to celebrate another birthday.”
“Not for four days.”
“Thank you, sweetheart.” Barbara gave him a long, thorough kiss, then pulled away and lowered her gaze. “I needed these—lately I’ve been wondering how you could still love me . . .”
The vulnerability in her voice tore at him. After setting the vase on the bedside table, he gathered her snugly into his arms. “Babs, why in the world would you question my love? Don’t I pay enough attention to you? I try, but with my job—”
“Don’t blame yourself, honey.” She patted his back. “It isn’t you, it’s me. I can’t seem to give you a baby.”
Squeezing her tightly, he whispered. “That reminds me. Guess who I saw today?”
She smiled. “Who?”
“Dr. Marc.”
She pulled back, her eyes assessing him through unshed tears. “You went to the doctor?”
He caught her fingers, then slowly and deliberately kissed each one. “Ayuh,” he said, his lips against her thumb. “And guess what? I’m fine—in fact, I’m better than fine.” He murmured these words against her index finger. “I’m healthy, got the cholesterol of a four-year-old.” He kissed her pinkie. “And Doc said he can’t see any reason I shouldn’t be able to father a child.”
Barbara sat back, her palm smothering a giggle.
Grinning, Russell waggled his brows. “Great news, huh?”
She nodded, her hand dropping back to her side. “Sure. Great news.”
He kissed her again, then propped his head on his palm. Her look of happiness had faded, and a shadow now lurked behind her eyes. “Why the worried look? Aren’t you happy?”
“Of course I’m happy.” She shrugged, reaching out to twirl a lock of his dark hair around her finger. “It’s just that—”
He sat up straighter. “What?”
“I am happy—but I didn’t know you were thinking about going to the doctor.”
“I wasn’t. Dr. Marc stopped by the boat Saturday morning to ask me about a leaky faucet he wants fixed, and the subject got around to kids. He asked if I’d had a physical lately and I hadn’t. So I went.”
“You hate doctors.”
“I don’t hate doctors, as a group, they’re all right. But this is different. If I was holding us back, I wanted to be sure I could get something done about it.”
Barbara’s eyes darkened further. “But if it isn’t you, it’s me.”
“Ah, hon, there’s nothing to the physical. It’s over before you know it, and Doc said it’s probably something very minor. Lots of women need to have a little fine-tuning. Doc said infertility could be caused by all sorts of things— maybe the ovary isn’t working right, or the Philippian tubes are damaged.”
Barbara smiled. “I think that’s fallopian tubes, honey.”
“Right. But there are a lot of things that could be stopping you from conceiving. And most are fixable.”
Dropping her head to her arm, Barbara closed her eyes, leaving Russell to guess at her thoughts. Was she afraid to have a baby? He couldn’t blame her if she were, with all of Cleta’s offhand remarks about the agonies of childbirth and how she considered labor the equivalent of passing a head of cabbage through the eye of a needle. That kind of talk would scare the daylights out of anybody.
Barbara opened her eyes and playfully pinched him. “Fine-tuning, huh? You’re confusing me with your boat engine.”
He drew her back into his arms and held her. They lay still for a moment, each digesting his news. He knew she was hesitant about motherhood; for all her maturity, she was still a child in Cleta’s house. Cleta deliberately kept her close, refusing to let Barbara meet life on its own terms. She had Barbara convinced motherhood was akin to sainthood, and not many deserved the honor.
“I’ll be with you all the way,” he murmured. “Through the labor, childbirth—I’ll even go to the doctor with you.”
“I’m capable of going to the doctor by myself, Russell.” Abruptly she sat up, reached for the remote, and switched the television to the evening news.
“Then why not go?” he persisted. “I’ll make the appointment and we’ll get it over with. If it turns out we can’t have children, then we’ll think about adoption. That takes time, and we need to get our name on a waiting list.”
“I don’t know . . .”
He reached out and turned her face toward his. “You got your hair cut; y
ou got contacts, and your mom lived through it. She’ll live through you going to see Dr. Marc. If you’re scared—”
“I’m not afraid. I’m delicate.” She rolled off the bed and walked to the window, then stood staring out at the darkness, her arms crossed. She shifted from one bare foot to the other. “You said the examination didn’t hurt?”
“Didn’t hurt at all.”
“Nothing like passing a cabbage?”
“No, Dr. Marc is very gentle, and very . . . understanding. I thought I’d be embarrassed, but he made it all seem matter-of-fact. He was great.”
“And we can afford it?”
“We can afford a dozen doctors. I have good insurance, so you can have the nicest room in the hospital if you want.”
“Or have the baby on the side of the road like that poor woman the women were talking about at quilting circle.”
“Good grief, Babs. That hardly ever happens. Childbirth today is quick and painless—”
“I don’t know about that. I’ve seen movies where women are screaming and fussing and hanging on the bedpost— some of them even die!”
He shook his head. “That’s only in the movies—and maybe in a few rare cases where the women weren’t in good health to begin with. Giving birth is a natural process.”
“Men can say that. Mom says if a man and woman took turns giving birth, there’d be only two children per family.”
Standing, he pulled her to him. “If I could have our child, I would.”
“Even if it felt like passing a cabbage?”
“Even then.” He held up his palm. “Honest.”
“Liar.”
He grinned.
“Well.” Barbara bit her lower lip, then shifted and sighed. “OK. I’ll go to see the doctor, but you have to let me do this in my own time and my own way. Doctors scare me, but if the problem is serious, we ought to start thinking about getting our name on an adoption list.”
He smiled down at her. “While you’re there, ask him about that cabbage thing. I’m sure he’ll have a different viewpoint.”
Her cheeks flamed crimson. “Russell Higgs! I couldn’t!”
Scooping her off her feet, Russell swung her around until she was breathless and giggling. Gently dropping her to the bed, Russell whispered, “Why don’t we give serious thought to that house we looked at the other day?”
“I loved it,” she admitted. “But it was kind of rundown. Could we look around a little more?”
“We can look to your heart’s content, but there isn’t that much available in Ogunquit, not in our price range.” His fingers walked along her rib cage, then began to tickle her. She squealed, thumping her heels on the floor as she laughed.
A sharp rap from beneath the floorboards brought their fun to an abrupt halt.
“Sorry,” Barbara said, frowning at the floor. They both knew the rap had come from the end of Cleta’s broom in the kitchen below. “I suppose she’ll be rapping again before long, telling us that dinner is getting cold.”
“Right now,” Russell said, breathing a kiss onto her neck, “I’m not hungry for dinner.”
Collapsing in a heap on the bed, the two lovers kissed, giggling between breaths as Cleta’s voice rose like a foghorn over the staircase. “What’s all that thumping! What are you two doing up there, moving furniture? You leave that furniture where it is! I paid a fortune to have that chair cleaned—don’t you be roughhousing and dirty it up.” Then, gruffly, “Supper in five minutes!”
Barbara and Russell sobered, their eyes caught in a lover’s moment. Barbara broke the silence first. “Whatever we do, we do it alone. We don’t tell Mom about the doctor’s appointment or the house. Not yet. Deal?”
He frowned. “That’s up to you, but having your mom involved might make it a little easier for you.”
“That’s the problem. If Dr. Marc finds anything wrong with me, she’ll worry herself to death, and she’ll hate any house we look at no matter what. She’ll imagine everything from termites to aliens in the attic. I know Mom. No, I’ll make the doctor’s appointment and I’ll go by myself. And we’ll go house hunting again Saturday. It’s better that way.”
Better for all concerned, Russell agreed, but by then his mind was centered on his pretty wife and the five minutes remaining before supper.
“Hey,” he whispered.
She laced her fingers through his. “Hey, what?”
“Will you fix that Mexican casserole for my birthday?”
Her eyes shone with warmth. “The one that gave you indigestion for a week?”
“It was great.” He squeezed her hand. “Great because you made it. You’re turning into a good cook.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“You’re welcome, miss.”
And for the next four minutes and thirty seconds, Russell and Barbara brushed the worries of the day aside.
Next door at the Kid Kare Center, Dana stared at her kitchen table and fought back tears. Three sets of dirty plates stared at her, but the fourth set, nearly arranged at her right hand, sat unused. Yakov had come promptly when she called, Buddy had finally come out of the dining room to eat, but Mike, her own loving husband, had sent word with Yakov that he’d come “in a minute.”
An hour had come and gone since that message, but Mike was still out in the carriage house workroom, sorting a new shipment of art prints from the wholesaler.
Resisting the tears that stung her eyes, she stood and began to clear the table. She knew she ought to be glad her husband had found work he enjoyed, but ever since getting that computer she scarcely saw more than the side of his head. Each morning he woke with the sun, ran to the dining room to check his ongoing auctions, and then he grabbed a quick cup of coffee and a sausage biscuit, which he ate while sitting at his computer.
After answering the e-mailed questions from bidders that had arrived during the night, he went out to the carriage house to select new prints to list for auction. She often overhead him and Yakov discussing the psychology of Internet auctions—if they listed more than two Van Gogh Harvest Landscapes in a single auction, weren’t they competing with themselves? Surely it was better to space out the Harvest Landscapes so they offered no more than one per week, but was it better to feature Van Gogh in one week and Monet in the next? Mike also tried to keep running charts on how much certain pictures sold for other dealers, so he could set a competitive starting bid price . . . the angles went on and on.
He’d been an eBay seller for only a couple of weeks, but Dana was already heartily sick of the entire process. Mike spent fifteen hours of every day either in the carriage house or at his computer, and she missed his company. He kept telling her that soon he’d grow his business enough to hire people to help share the burden, but Dana wasn’t sure that day would ever come. After all, he had Yakov’s help now, and he could probably have Buddy’s help if he needed it (and dared risk it), yet he was still working one hundred hours a week. Shoot, most people were only awake one hundred twelve hours a week—she’d done the math.
She slid a load of dishes onto the counter and plugged the sink, then ran the water, holding her fingers beneath the stream to test its heat. She ought to let Mike have it with both barrels when he finally came in. They rarely argued, so they were overdue for a heated discussion. She would tell him that she didn’t marry him just to clean his house; she’d remind him that due to her trust-fund income they didn’t need a ton of additional money. He didn’t need a career, but she needed a husband. She needed his attention; she wanted to see his face a few times a day; she wanted him to look at her when she talked. She wanted him to eat the lunches and dinners she cooked while they were still hot; she wanted him to lie in bed with her and watch TV until they were both so sleepy they couldn’t hold their eyes open . . .
Her thoughts trailed away as she realized how selfish she would sound if she said those things. She needed? Mike needed things, too; surely he did. Men needed to feel useful, they needed to know they were contributing t
o the support of a household. Buddy might fashion a career of doing nothing, but Buddy was an anomaly. Mike had turned their ramshackle old house into a lovely home and school, but now that work was finished. The Kennebunk Kid Kare Center wasn’t his thing—everyone knew the school was really Dana’s occupation. She supervised the kids, she put up the bulletin boards, she served sandwiches and took the kids out for walks on the beach on sunny days. Mike had single-handedly renovated that little bathroom off the classroom, but men didn’t get extra credit for those kinds of things. Everyone just took that kind of work for granted.
She dropped a handful of silverware into the soapy water and watched it glisten through the suds like the silver lining at the base of a cloud bank. Yes, Mike had needs, too, and maybe she was approaching this problem from the wrong perspective. Her mother had always told her a girl could catch more flies with honey than vinegar . . .
She paused a moment, her hands in the dishwater, then smiled as an idea bloomed in her brain. Why not surprise Mike with something unexpected? He would probably stay out in the carriage house for another hour or so, then he might come in and return to the computer. But he’d eventually come upstairs, and if she had put everything away in the kitchen he wouldn’t stop to eat. So if she planned a little surprise picnic . . .
Grinning, she began to scrub with renewed purpose.
Cleta scrubbed a baking dish and laid it in the drainer. Barbara hadn’t eaten much tonight, and when he wasn’t looking at his wife, Russell had mostly kept his eyes on the food. Barbara seemed preoccupied; now, what could that be about? The two lovebirds had made eyes at each other all during the meal, occasionally snickering, and Cleta wondered if they weren’t playing footsies under the table. She hadn’t seen a thing humorous about their behavior. All through dinner, Floyd talked about the Wickam’s bathroom and giggled at the thought of the pastor’s discomfiture. Edith, though, must find the bathroom situation anything but funny. From what Cleta’d heard, the room looked like a demolition zone.
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