by P. G. Forte
He smiled at that, his eyes gleaming with amusement, and she felt a small glimmer of annoyance. Damn it, she was the one who was supposed to be able to read minds. Yet, he seemed to be doing a pretty fair job of reading hers.
“Right,” he answered, and then added unnecessarily. “Not what I meant, of course.”
“Oh. Well, would you like to go inside now?” She turned her head back toward the other side of the glade where the cabin stood, radiant in the sunlight.
He sighed, and she thought he sounded just the slightest bit wistful as he answered, “Certainly. After you.”
They crossed the lawn in silence, and she tried to block from her mind the sense of him, so close behind her. As they neared the cabin, she made herself concentrate instead on the drowsy humming of the bees as they foraged among the rosemary that grew in cascading waves of green and periwinkle around the foundation of the cabin. The smell of the rosemary was so deliciously pungent, she stopped to pick a piece so that she could fill her lungs with more of the fragrance. She was suddenly overcome with the desire to stay right where she was. To feel the sunlight, warm and gentle against all of her skin. To lie naked in the soft grass, surrounded by the scents of rosemary and cedar and violet. To make love – right here, right now, right this moment. To feel her heart pound, feel her breath come faster. And to feel Sam, as well. Naked and hard against her, inside her, touching her everywhere, making—
Omigod. Her eyes flew open. She gasped, startled at the images and sensations that poured through her. What was she thinking? Glancing quickly at his face, she saw awareness glowing in the depths of his quicksilver eyes. The sprig of rosemary fell from her fingers as she stumbled blindly backwards up onto the large granite block that made up the back stoop. She fumbled for the handle of the screen door, her fingers scrabbling on the weathered surface of the wood, as if searching for a way to restore her to sanity.
The rusty creak of the hinges helped some, and then she was in the kitchen. Celeste’s kitchen. Everything so familiar, so evocative of her friend, that it drove every other thought from her head.
The kitchen’s interior had always struck Marsha as being a continuation of the glade itself. Everything harmonized in subtle, pale shades of green and brown. But softer somehow, cooler, more muted than the outside world. So you felt as though you had entered an enchanted underwater garden. The effect was strengthened by the wavering beams of sunlight that filtered into the room through rows of Mexican, green-glass tumblers lined up on narrow shelves in front of the window.
Sadness pierced her at the sight of Celeste’s collection of hand thrown plates and bowls. Sage-green, cinnamon and sand colored, they stood stacked and waiting on the thick cedar plank shelves of the pantry; matching cups hanging neatly beneath them.
Loss tore through her heart once more.
“You’re thinking about your friend again, aren’t you?”
Sam’s voice came from somewhere behind her, but she was lost to everything but the grief welling up inside of her, and could only nod mutely. “Would you like me to make you some tea?” he asked quietly. She could only nod again before she fled from the room.
Sam busied himself in the kitchen, listening to the muffled sounds emanating from the living room, waiting for the silence that would tell him she had recovered her composure.
He thought about going to her, holding her as he had last night when she’d cried. But somehow, he didn’t think she would appreciate the gesture. Things were different now between them. Changed somehow. Complicated. The kiss had done that. And while he wasn’t exactly sorry for it, he had to admit it had not been one of his brighter ideas. Because the last thing he needed in his life right now were more complications.
He moved quietly and deliberately about the room, filling the kettle at the old white porcelain sink, placing cups and plates on a tray, adding a pitcher of milk, and a jar of honey when he could find no sugar. He’d picked blackberries that morning, from vines he discovered down near the creek, and now he added a bowl of them to the tray as well.
There were several canisters of tea to choose from, and he picked a dark, smoky brew – similar to a Lapsang Souchong. Something earthy, bracing and robust was what was called for, he thought. Something that would ground her and bring her back from sorrow. Maybe all the way back to that other place he sensed they’d been headed for a few minutes ago, out by the back steps.
A place as thick with complications as the blackberry vines had been thick with thorns.
The last place he should be thinking of going, right now.
He couldn’t wait.
He was amazed at the strength of his attraction for her. He tried once more to analyze it, while he waited for the water to boil, and for the sounds of her sobbing to subside.
It was this place. It had to be this place. Something about this weird little town was affecting him in the strangest ways. He had spent the better part of the last twenty-four hours thinking about this woman, staring at her, talking to her, even touching her. And he was not one bit closer to recognizing what it was in either her features or her expressions or her mind that he found so compelling, knowing only that it seemed to be everything at once.
Her lips alone, though – so soft and full and just hinting at an erogenous prehensibility he found irresistible – were enough, all by themselves, to almost make him lose his mind. He’d made sure of that last night.
And then there were her eyes, in whose fathomless green depths he’d swear he now and again caught glimpses of eternity. Of his own personal paradise, waiting to be discovered and explored.
He didn’t think it had anything to do with the clothes she wore. Although he had to admit that there had been something unexpectedly appealing about the sight of her huddled in his jacket, last night. She was dressed today in a loose, floaty, peacock colored outfit. Green and bronze and navy blue, its loose lines only hinting at the lush body she had pressed so tightly against his on the ride back to the Marina.
As distracted as it had made him, he had enjoyed the feel of her, round and full and soft. So very soft. He smiled, thinking now about how she’d melted in his arms when he kissed her. But his smile faded fast when he recalled the stunning sense of loss that hit him afterwards, as he watched her drive away.
Complications. Major complications.
Maybe it had something to do with the way she moved? He had noticed it again, today – out there in the glade. She moved with an unconscious, graceful dignity. Not just as if she were at home in this place, but as if she were an integral part of everything around her.
Her hair, those heavy coils of bronze and copper commingled, were a near match for the bark of the cedar trees she had pointed out to him. And he could easily imagine that the freckles on her skin were an exotic form of camouflage she’d adapted to allow her to hide within the dappled woods.
He knew that if he never learned the answer, the question of whether those freckles extended over the whole of her body in equal profusion, would haunt him for the rest of his days.
For the rest, as he’d guessed from her picture, she was neither tall nor thin nor young. And she had none of the cool sophisticated veneer he’d always favored. There was no reason at all for him to feel the way he did. And yet, there was something about the woman that he found completely irresistible.
The teakettle commenced a soft, mournful wailing, and at the same moment, Sam realized that the sound of Marsha’s sobs had stopped. Quickly he poured the boiling water into the teapot and, picking up the tray, carried it inside.
“Tea’s ready,” Sam announced from the doorway.
Marsha jumped and spun around from the table, the envelope of photographs still in her hand. She eyed him curiously. The man was a major mystery, no doubt about it.
“I’d forgotten about these photos,” she told him, cautiously, feeling her way. “Had you looked at them? Before yesterday, I mean.”
“You’re asking if I recognized you from your snapshots, when I saw
you yesterday morning?” he asked, smiling his magician’s smile.
“Yes, I guess I am.”
“Then yes. I did.” He crossed the room and put the tea tray down on the table. “I came across them Friday night. I spent quite a bit of time looking at them, actually. And wondering who you were.”
“Oh.” Why was that? They were unexceptional photos, and she knew herself to be unexceptional, as well. Yet, the way he looked at her sometimes, the way he smiled, the things he said, made it all too easy for her to forget that fact. Made it all too easy for her to feel special
She frowned, not certain what, exactly, she wanted to know, or how to ask, or even why it seemed important. “So, that’s why when you saw me yesterday morning, you smiled at me?”
He looked at her for a moment without speaking, then moved closer, until he was standing right in front of her. “Well, that was one of the reasons,” he said as he took her face between his hands. His words were no answer at all, but his hands were warm. Strong, yet at the same time gentle. And her mouth was suddenly dry.
She swallowed several times, surprised all over again by how good it felt to have him stand this close to her. And by how much she wanted to touch him, too.
He looked deep within her eyes, and smiled. “It’s no use, you know,” he said as he shook his head slightly.
“What’s not?”
“Trying to pretend that it – this – doesn’t exist between us. Trying to fight it.”
She wasn’t sure what he was talking about, or who he thought was pretending. Certainly, neither of them seemed to be fighting anything at the moment. But before she had a chance to put her questions into words, he’d lowered his face to hers and was kissing her again. And just like last night, she felt herself swept away by the urgency and emotion she could feel radiating from him.
It was like being part of a waterfall. His energy cascaded over her as she stood within his aura, lights and colors showering around the both of them. Her own emotions were a chaotic swirl of need and desire and lust. When his hands slid down to cup her breasts, she pressed herself into his palms, her hands closing tightly on his arms.
Oh, sweet heaven, she wanted this. Wanted to be touched by him. Wanted, so very, very much, to throw herself headlong into the fires she knew waited – ready to be ignited – in both of them.
But it’s too soon for that, a part of her protested. Way too soon. Everything between them was happening too fast. She didn’t do things like this, she thought, desperately trying to find her pace with him. She’d never done things like this. And never this quickly.
But that wasn’t quite true, was it? She had done something like this. Exactly once. That was how she’d ended up with her daughter. She’d learned her lesson then, and learned it well enough that now just the thought of it was enough to douse the fires. She pulled away from him hastily, looked up to see slumberous eyes open and gaze back down at her, his face an unreadable mask.
“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I-I can’t do this.”
“Why?” he asked simply. And as unemotionally, she thought, suddenly furious, as if she’d just announced that she wouldn’t eat seedless grapes.
She would have liked for him to sound a little disappointed. He sounded as if he didn’t care, one way or another, but she was certain he’d already made the assumption they’d end up in bed. Only one day after they’d met? What did he take her for?
It didn’t improve her mood to realize how close he’d come to being right.
“Because it’s too soon for that,” she blurted out, and was instantly sorry. He lifted one eyebrow and she hurriedly added, “And anyway, you’re only going to be here for a few weeks.”
“Exactly. So too soon doesn’t really factor into the equation,” he agreed affably as his hands slid around her waist and pulled her close again. “Does it?”
“There’s no way this could ever develop into anything meaningful,” she elaborated, only to wince at the look of disbelief that slid across his face.
“What is it you want it to develop into?” he asked with a mocking smile. “We’re both adults. Can’t we just give each other a little pleasure? Does it really have to be any more meaningful than that?”
“I think it does,” she said quietly. “For me. I don’t think I can be that casual about this.” She looked in his face, and bridled at the skeptical look he gave her. “Look,” she continued, feeling her own face flush, “I realize that, because of some of the things I said yesterday, you’ve probably figured I make it a habit to jump in and out of beds, but—”
“Relax,” he snapped, dropping his hands from her waist and turning back toward the table. He picked up the teapot and calmly poured out two mugs of tea. “I haven’t made any assumptions about your character, or your morals, or however you might want to phrase it.” He set the teapot down carefully, picked up the mugs and turned back around. “It’s not that big a deal,” he said with a shrug as he handed one of the mugs to her. “If you don’t want to, you don’t want to. I just thought it would be... enjoyable.” His eyes wandered over her body as he spoke, and she could almost feel his gaze touching her as it lingered here and there.
Enjoyable? Longing and regret tugged at her heart. Oh, heavens, yes. Probably amazingly so. Hugely, immensely, divinely enjoyable. Right up until that fateful moment when he’d turn away, and her heart would shatter – with all the finesse of a fluorescent light bulb.
“That’s a very non-Catholic viewpoint, I’m afraid,” she sighed.
He looked at her over the rim of his mug, clearly surprised. “So that’s the problem? I hadn’t figured you for a Catholic.”
“Oh, I’m not really.” Marsha smiled ruefully. “But I’m afraid it might be one of those bred in the bone things. I was raised one, and there’s still a lot that I can’t seem to shake.”
“Well, if that’s the way you feel about it.” He opened the laptop computer she’d noticed on the table earlier and pressed the power button. “Then I guess there’s nothing more to say.” He shrugged again and pulled out a chair “Now... if you’ll excuse me, I have some work to do.”
“Right,” Marsha agreed, setting her mug down on the table. “Me, too. I’ll just go ahead and get started on the bedroom closet.”
“Great. Holler if you need help with anything,” he answered, settling down into the chair.
Yeah. Great. Marsha thought to herself, as she headed for the bedroom. Just fucking perfect. So how come she felt so lousy?
Several hours later, Marsha decided she had done all she could do for the day. Celeste’s clothes had been packed up and stored in the cabin’s small attic. The excess books and miscellaneous personal items that had cluttered the living room and bedroom had been moved to the outdoor shed. And Sam had assured her that he had no problem with her leaving everything else exactly as it was.
“It’s actually very comfortable this way,” he told her, smiling a little self-consciously. “Really, you’re doing me a favor by leaving things like this. It’s... homey.” He chuckled slightly. “Not like my home, you understand, but...”
“I know what you mean,” Marsha agreed, inexplicably pleased that he was smiling at her again. “It’s not like my home, either, but it’s so extremely home-like, that you almost forget that.”
Her glance fell on the computer screen. A wavering series of black and white bars marched across it. It was something like a bar graph, she guessed, but the bars were of varying thicknesses as well as different lengths.
“What are you working on?” she asked with a nod toward the screen.
“Oh, that? Japanese Candlestick charts,” he answered, obviously unaware that he’d lapsed into a foreign language. “I’m studying the Fibonacci expansion.”
“Huh?”
“They’re tools for trading the stock market. The candlesticks measure the price and sentiment of the market.”
“Sentiment, huh?” She smiled at that. “I didn’t know the stock market could have sentiments.�
�
“Sure. The market is people, isn’t it? Buyers and sellers, right? And they trade according to how they feel. What they believe at the moment. On the hopes and fears that motivate them.”
“And these things,” she motioned at the screen again. “These lines... measure those sentiments?”
“Yeah, sure,” he said, clearly warming to the topic. “See, it all depends on whether they’re black or white, full bodies or half bodies, long or short. If they have wicks or not. Which way the wicks extend. You look for one or more candlesticks which form a recognizable pattern.”
“Patterns, huh?” She thought about that. She understood about patterns. Tea leaf readings, rune casting, tarot cards, the I Ching, scrying with clouds – all of those were based on patterns, as well. She found it hard to believe that he was thinking along the same lines as she was. But hadn’t she seen, and often enough, how everything in life was connected? Why should this be any different?
“See here?” He pointed to three thick, black sticks in a row, descending from left to right “That’s called Three Black Crows and it means the market is going to go lower.”
“Crows, huh?”
“Well, they’re black, and there’s a Japanese saying... I don’t remember exactly… something about bad news having wings so—” He pressed a few buttons, and another graph appeared. “This here is called a Morning Star, or Mercury Rising.”
Marsha stared at the bar he was indicating, a small bar at the bottom of the graph, followed by several white ascending bars.
“That little thing there? What’s it supposed to mean?”
“Well the morning star is visible just before dawn, right? And so when this pattern forms, it signals that the market is going up.”
“Huh.” Marsha shook her head in bemusement. “So, what you’re saying is, it’s just like the I Ching.”
“It’s like the what? No!” Sam spun around and stared at her. He looked appalled. “Of course I’m not. That – that’s just ridiculous.”