A Different Kind of Blues

by Gwynne Forster

  He squeezed her fingers. “I hope you haven’t been disappointed. I came to California as a tourist and just couldn’t leave. It’s great out here. I was born and raised in Philadelphia. What do you do? What do you like? Tell me. I need to know that you’re real, that you’re not an apparition.”

  “I’m real, all right,” she said and bit back the words, but I don’t know for how long.

  “What have you seen since you’ve been here?” She told him. “Ah, so you haven’t been to San Simeon, Coit Tower, Alamo Square or…Have you been on one of the cable cars?”

  “I haven’t done any of that. Should I?”

  He leaned forward, his face animated with what seemed to her an inner joy. “Yes, you should, and with me. I’m free tomorrow after one-thirty. Let me show you around.”

  She wanted to back off, to slow him down, but in his eyes there shone everything she had dreamed of in a man, everything she’d missed. At least once, couldn’t she know what most adult women experienced throughout their adult lives? And could she have it without hurting him?

  “Will you?” he urged.

  “What can I say?” she replied, thinking aloud. “Fate’s dancing her crazy little jig again.”

  “Absolutely,” he said, solemn for the first time, “and I want to dance along with her. Don’t you?”

  The choice had been taken from her. She wanted to be with him for as long as she could. I could love this man as I’ve never loved anyone. I know I’ll only have a couple of days with him, but that little bit is more than I dreamed possible. What I’m doing isn’t right but…Is it? For him, I could be only a passing summer shower, so what could be wrong with a loving exchange? The waiter brought the crab quiche that she ordered for a first course, and her thoughts shifted to the food.

  She noticed that he hadn’t begun to eat and looked at him inquiringly. “What is it?”

  “Will you meet me at the registration desk at one-thirty tomorrow? I don’t want to lose you, Petra.”

  “Yes, I will. Now, eat your soup.”

  They sat there talking long after they’d finished the meal, talked until the waiter asked for the third time if they wanted anything else. Petra looked around, saw that she and Winston were the only patrons in the dining room, and said, “I think they want to close.”

  Winston looked at his watch. “Good grief, it’s eleven o’clock. We’ve been talking for three and a half hours.” He stood, walked around to assist her, and when she felt his hand on her back through the thin fabric of her dress, gentle but firm, as if it belonged there, she wanted to lean into him.

  “I’m not ready to leave you,” he said. “There’s a nightclub next door, but we can enter it through that hall behind the elevators. Want to go there for a while?” She nodded, her emotions so near the surface that she couldn’t speak. He reached for her hand, and she joined hers with his.

  “What do you want to drink?” he asked her after they seated themselves.

  The doctor had warned her about drinking alcoholic beverages. “I don’t need any more wine. Do you think they’ll serve me ginger ale?”

  “Of course. I think I’ll have the same.”

  Her eyebrows shot up. “If you’d rather have something stronger,” she said. “It’s all right with me. I’m from a small town, and we don’t drink much. At least I don’t.”

  “Ginger ale is fine. I have to make a presentation tomorrow morning at eight, and I also don’t want demon alcohol to becloud my senses in regard to you.”

  “What do you do, Winston?”

  “I design furniture and home furnishings, but I’m happiest creating furniture.”

  “That’s interesting. I work for a real estate agency…or did. My boss has probably fired me by now.”

  “He can’t do that, can he?”

  “He told me to bring my cell phone on vacation so he could call me whenever he needed to, but I deliberately left it home. He’d call me every half hour, and I didn’t want that.”

  “Why should he do that? A vacation is just that, time away from the everyday stress of the office.”

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” the master of ceremonies said, “give it up for the great Jackie Barrow, the number one comedian of our time.”

  The applause died down, and Jackie strode onstage decked out in a canary-yellow suit, yellow lizard-skin shoes, white shirt, and yellow tie.

  “Don’t I look good?” he began. Petra tuned him out. The only voice she wanted to hear belonged to the man beside her.

  “Want to dance?” Winston asked her.

  She hadn’t realized that Jackie what’s-his-name had left the stage and the band had replaced him. “Winston, this is moving so fast.”

  “I know, but don’t be afraid of me, Petra. I will never do anything to hurt you.” He stood and held out his hand to her, and she took it, knowing that her body would follow her heart.

  “I’m not afraid of you, Winston, just scared to death of what is happening to me with a man I met a few hours ago.”

  Holding her hand, he walked with her the few feet to the dance floor. “I’m as vulnerable as you are and just as scared.”

  He opened his arms, and when she moved into them, she thought her heart skidded to the pit of her belly. Her breasts pressed against his chest, hardening her nipples, and she stepped back, too embarrassed to look into his eyes. His fingers stroked her back as if with the intent to soothe her, and the swinging of his hips along with the drummer’s seductive rhythm nearly reduced her to putty. Her hand wound its way to his nape, and she tucked her head beneath his chin while she swung her body to his rhythm. Had she danced with him all her life? It seemed that way.

  “The music stopped, sweetheart,” he said after hugging her. “Would you rather sit down or wait for the next one?”

  She was about to say she’d like to wait for the next dance, but her head suddenly began to pain her. “I guess I’d better sit,” she said. “My head has decided to hurt.” She neglected to tell him about her slight dizziness.

  Walking back to the table, he asked her, “Does it hurt often?”

  “It depends. They’re something like migraines.”

  “Perhaps you’re tired after so much sight-seeing today. I’ve kept you too long. Would you like to leave now?”

  “I think so, although I’m enjoying being with you.”

  He walked with her to her room. “I’m not going to ask you if I can come in, but I…I want to kiss you. Does that surprise you?”

  She smiled because she wanted him to know how she felt about him. “No, it doesn’t surprise me.” She reached up and stroked the side of his face with the back of her hand while he stared at her, his expression fierce and his eyes stormy.

  She closed her eyes, and his lips touched hers, not with the powerful and explosive passion that she expected, but with a soft, gentle loving that sent shivers throughout her body. He flicked his tongue across the seam of her lips, and she opened to him, sucked him into her, and felt him tremble a second before he put her away from him.

  “Do you have anything for that headache?” She nodded. “Take it, and try to sleep,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow at one-thirty.”

  She pressed a quick kiss on his lips and said, “You’re wonderful,” opened her door, went inside, and left him standing there. She didn’t remember having done many things that demanded so much self-discipline as not asking him to come in. More than anything he’d said or done, his kiss told her the kind of man he was, and as much as she wanted to invite him to spend the night with her, she didn’t dare.

  If only she had met Winston Fleet years ago, or if she had more time now! Maybe she shouldn’t pity herself, but give thanks that she’d met him at all. “I promised myself I wouldn’t wallow in self-pity, and I won’t,” she said to herself, but it didn’t escape her that she had to remind herself of that promise with increasing frequency.

  “At least, I’ll see him tomorrow.” She slept fitfully, anxious for one-thirty and the moment
she would see him again.

  After a breakfast of tomato juice, sausage, scrambled eggs, biscuits, and coffee, Petra strolled around the corner from the hotel to the shops she saw the previous day and bought a pair of white pants and some white sneakers. Her feet had taken a beating since she left Ellicott City. Winston hadn’t suggested that they eat lunch together, so she bought a hamburger, a bottle of ginger ale, and a box of stationery, went back to her room, and ate lunch.

  She wrote letters to her mother and to Krista, asking their forgiveness for not having told them of her illness and its prognosis, and penned a note to Goodman Prout that read:

  Dear Goodman,

  Mama and Krista don’t know how sick I am, and when I’m gone, they’ll be shocked. Please support them in every way that you can. I know Krista must have gotten close to you by now, and you must have learned that she can be difficult, but she’s really a good child. Learning about you shocked her, and she’s been acting out ever since. She hasn’t forgiven me, but she will. Please take good care of her but, in doing so, don’t neglect your wife and other children.

  Yours, Petra

  With a sigh of resignation, she addressed the letters, put them in the envelopes, sealed them, and stored them in her pocketbook. Someone would find them there and deliver them.

  After changing into her white pants, yellow and white-striped shirt, yellow jacket, and white sneakers, she left the hotel and window-shopped near it, trying to make the time pass. At twenty-five minutes after one, she headed back to the hotel.

  She saw him standing beside the registration desk and told herself not to run. She hadn’t previously known a man like Winston; indeed she hadn’t developed close relationships with many men, and never had she reacted to one as she did to him. Nor had she been as secure with a man—not even Goodman—as she was with Winston Fleet. Maybe that was because she had nothing to lose. She’d known taller and more handsome men, but at about six feet and maybe an inch or two, a slim figure, smooth brown skin and large, beautiful, dark eyes, he’d taken her breath away.

  He rushed to meet her and handed her a red rose. As if she’d done it all of her life, she kissed the side of his mouth. “Thank you. I love flowers, and I shall cherish this rose for as long as I live.”

  He slid an arm around her shoulder. “It will crumble long before you make your exit,” he said. “I have my car in the garage. Want to see the Hearst Castle in San Simeon?”

  “I want to go wherever you take me, but first I want to put my rose in some water. Be right back.” When she returned a few minutes later, he said, “You moved so fast, you didn’t give me a chance to tell you how nice you look.”

  “Thanks. You look nice, too,” she said of his tan suit. It occurred to her that he left his business associates and came directly to the hotel to meet her. “Have you had lunch, Winston? I’m not hungry, because I ate a hamburger about an hour ago.”

  “Thanks for thinking about me,” he said, “but I had coffee and a scone a little after eleven. We can grab a bite along the way somewhere.”

  Being with him seemed so natural. He explained the sights as they drove along, and, as he talked, she thought she heard a voice say, “He’s falling for you. What you’re doing’s not right.” When she turned around, she expected to see her grandfather sitting in the back seat.

  I won’t give him up. I can’t. I need him! Just one more thing to tell the Reverend Collins, provided she saw him again.

  Winston drove carefully, well within the speed limit, and, after about an hour, stopped at a roadside restaurant. “Hey, Winston,” a young boy who proved to be the busboy said, “where’ve you been? We haven’t seen you in months.”

  “I know,” he said. “I’ve been inundated with work. How’s Alma?”

  “Mama’s fine. She and Papa went to buy a new computer. What can I get you?”

  “Petra, this is Jake.” He patted the boy’s shoulder. Jake was an eager teenager of about fifteen. “I want a bacon, lettuce, and tomato wrap with a big pickle and a cup of coffee with milk. What do you want, Petra?”

  She didn’t have to worry about gaining weight, so she was going to eat all the fattening food she wanted. “Two scoops of pecan praline ice cream. If it’s real good, I’ll have another scoop.”

  “You must have perfect metabolism,” Winston said. “Girl after my own heart.” A smile roamed over his face. “And in more ways than one.”

  She gasped at the sight of the Hearst Castle. “This brochure says it has one hundred and sixty-five rooms. What would one family do with that much space?”

  “Entertain friends. I imagine all the world’s bigwigs slept there during Hearst’s day.”

  “He sure was lucky he came along before television, when people still read morning, afternoon, and evening editions of newspapers. If he was starting now, he might be as poor as the next guy trying to make people read.”

  “I don’t know about that,” Winston said. “A creative man—and Hearst was, if anything, very creative—is always a man of his time. He might have had thirty cable TV stations.”

  After they explored as much of the castle as their energy would allow, he drove down to the ocean, found a boulder on the beach, and sat there with her. “I know we’re going to separate, because you’ll return to Maryland, but I don’t want this to end. I can’t let it end. However strange it may seem, you’re locked in my heart, and you were before you sat down at that table last night. One look as you walked toward me, and you alone were important to me. I’ve heard that a person could affect you this way but, until now, I didn’t believe it.”

  With his confession, guilt weighed more heavily upon her. She knew he waited to know what she felt for him, and she had promised herself that she wouldn’t lie about anything again.

  She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and looked at him. “Winston, nothing so powerful as this ever happens to one person. I’m thirty-six years old, and I have an eighteen-year-old daughter, but I have never before felt for anyone what I feel for you. Never.”

  He stared at her as if he knew what would come next, and that he wouldn’t accept it. “But?”

  “But it has to end. I told myself to take what you were willing to give, because I need it so badly, but I care so much for you. I can’t do it.”

  He pressed his hands to her knees as he faced her. “Have you committed a crime? I mean, are you on the lam?”

  “In a way I am, although I haven’t committed a crime.”

  “I don’t understand. Talk to me, baby.”

  I won’t go to pieces. I won’t let him see me crack up.

  He grasped her shoulders, leaned toward her, and kissed her eyes and her lips. “No matter what you tell me, you’ll always be in my heart.”

  She shook her head from side to side, pushing back the truth, denying it, wishing she’d had the strength to tell him he couldn’t join her for dinner at her table.

  “Tell me, sweetheart,” he urged.

  “I…I’m ill, and I…I have less than two months to live.”

  He stared at her with quivering lips and wide eyes, an expression of horror on his face. “Don’t tell me that. It isn’t true. It can’t be.”

  “But it is, Winston. I shouldn’t have let you come to my table last night, but when I looked at you sitting there, it was too late. I wanted desperately to be with you. Can’t we…have today and tonight together? Tomorrow, I’ll leave you.”

  “Are you sure of the diagnosis?”

  “I have a brain tumor, and that’s what causes the headaches.”

  “I see. For once in my life, I’ve found the woman I needed, and now this….”

  “Oh, Winston. I’m so sorry.”

  “It isn’t your fault. My problem is that I want so badly to help you, but I can’t even read an X-ray.”

  “Don’t worry. I had so many tests that the doctors can’t possibly have overlooked one.”

  “How can you be so cheerful?”

  “I’m not cheerful, but
I’ve accepted it, and if you do too, our remaining time together can be wonderful. Let’s go out tonight and have a good time.”

  “I’m not good at fooling myself, Petra. I’ve never been so miserable in my life.”

  She slid to her knees, unmindful of what the sand could do to her white pants, reached up, and pressed her hands to his cheeks. “I’d change it if I could, and as much for you as for me. Let’s envision ourselves together in the next life, and—”

  “Doing what?” he interrupted. “Skipping through Heaven wearing white wings?”

  She kissed the tip of his nose. “You’d rather shovel coal?”

  He laughed, and she put her arms around him. “At least we have each other now. My grandfather said, ‘Know when you’re happy, because happiness is a temporary thing.’”

  “He had a point there. Suppose we go back to San Francisco. I’ll take you through Alamo Square, show you the ‘postcard row’ Victorian houses, and we can see Nob Hill before we go back to the hotel. If you brought any dressy clothes, we could—”

  “I have a really fancy dress that I’ve never worn.”

  “Great. I’ll call for you at about seven, and we’ll go to a good restaurant and then come back to the hotel’s night club. Would you like that? Or we could—”

  “I’d love it. I don’t really care what we do. I just want to be with you.”

  He stood, lifted her, and folded her in his arms. “If I dared to kiss you, I’d risk indictment for unseemly behavior. I need desperately to be alone with you.” He shook his head as if in wonder. “How is it possible that I love you?”

  “I’ve asked myself the same question,” she said.

  They walked arm-in-arm up the long slope to his car, and as he began the drive, the sound of Ray Charles singing and playing “What’d I Say” came over the radio. Winston sang some passages with Ray, looked at her, and grinned, and she wanted to shout for joy. Their first crisis took its toll, but it had passed. She leaned back and let her mind wander to Krista and how her daughter would fare without her.