Driven To Distraction

by Judith Duncan

  He grinned again and turned away. “I’ll remember that.”

  As he started down the steps, Maggie looked at the beer and leftover pizza. “Hey. You’re forgetting something.”

  He turned, and she indicated the stuff he had brought with him. Tony shook his head. “My treat, Burrows. Have it for breakfast.”

  Maggie went over to stand at the railing, rubbing her upper arms. “Beer and cold pizza aren’t my idea of breakfast, Parnelli.”

  Totally ignoring her, he headed down the steps, then stopped with his back to her. Turning, he gazed up at her, his expression oddly intent. “You’re right,” he said, his voice very quiet, very serious. “I did forget something.”

  He came back to where she was standing, then stopped, his gaze locked on her. He stared at her a moment, then, before she had an inkling of what he intended, he framed her face with his hands, tipped her head back and covered her mouth in a full, searching kiss. The instant his lips touched hers, Maggie’s heart dropped, setting off a frantic, breathless flutter in her chest that made her knees want to buckle. Her whole body flooded with a sudden weakness, and she closed her eyes and gripped his arms. Tony tightened his grip on her face, making a low, approving sound. Holding her immobile, he shifted the angle of his head, realigning his mouth against hers in a slow, deep, wet kiss that set off an explosion of colored lights behind her eyelids. Electric sensations coursed through her, and Maggie opened her mouth beneath his, the taste of him sending another flood of weakness through her.

  He took his time, as if he were drinking in a thousand sensations, as if he couldn’t get enough of the taste of her. Maggie was out of breath and trembling when he finally dragged his lips away. Roughly pressing her face against the curve of his neck, he wrapped her in a tight, fierce embrace, his chest heaving.

  Shaken and weak, with her heart hammering so hard that she could not catch her breath, Maggie nestled her face tighter against him, her whole body quivering. Oh, God. She had wondered what it would be like. And now she knew. Not even in her wildest imagination had she ever dreamt that she could feel like this.

  Brushing her hair aside, Tony tucked his head against hers, then cradled her tighter against him. He didn’t say anything. He just held on to her, his breathing still uneven against her ear.

  He held her like that for a long time, until the trembling stopped and she was able to relax her grip around his waist. Then he brushed her mouth with one last, soft kiss and loosened his hold. “Go to bed, Maggie Burrows,” he whispered unevenly. With one final glance, he went down the steps and disappeared into the darkness. Maggie closed her eyes and hugged herself, still shaken and unsteady. She felt as if she’d just been shoved out of a fast-moving train.

  It was a feeling that did not go away. It was as if that one single kiss had pulled the plug on her safe little world, leaving everything out of focus. The entire next day, Maggie wandered around the house in a daze, trying to reassemble herself. Part of the problem was pure, simple exhaustion. Every time she closed her eyes, the same sensations piled in on her, making her restless and tense. It was almost as if her skin was too tight, leaving every nerve stretched and oversensitized.

  It got so bad that she considered going back to work, but she knew that would be courting disaster. So she spent the day pacing around her house, feeling either too cold or too hot, experiencing the most unnerving lapses. Lapses in concentration. Lapses in memory. And most of all, big gaping lapses in rationality. And she didn’t dare stop moving, because every time she did, she’d get lost in the memory of that kiss, and she’d experience the weakening sensations all over again.

  Kelly was convinced her mother was coming down with something. Maggie was convinced she’d simply lost her mind. By Friday morning, she was practically staggering around the house. She honestly didn’t realize just how strung out she was until she more or less passed out in her cornflakes. Kelly had already left for school, and Maggie was at the kitchen table, trying to make herself eat. In a wave of despair over her lapse in pure common sense, she’d put her head down on the table. She woke up six hours later, at two in the afternoon, with the weave of her placemat pressed into her face.

  It was at that point that she realized she had to get a grip; if she didn’t she was going to end up in a white rubber room. So she spent the day giving herself a hard, cold reality check. She was forty-three years old. And according to the information Kelly had passed on, he was thirty-four. That was nine years difference—or sixty-three in dog years. She had two grown children and one who was getting there. He had a freewheeling life-style that was eons away from her own. And, she told herself hard-heartedly, one kiss—no matter how earthshattering it was—did not mean anything. It was only a kiss. Maybe he’d just been lonely that night. Maybe she’d just been handy. He was Italian, for heaven’s sake; he probably kissed everyone that way. An image of him with some tall, gorgeous Stevie prototype took shape in her mind, and Maggie put her head down on the table again. Maybe she should just sell her house and move.

  One thing about hard cold reality—it definitely put things back into focus. Painfully so. She was in the middle of some midlife crisis. And she was just going to have to get over it. But oh lord, she thought, pressing her head into folded arms, he had made her feel things she hadn’t thought she was capable of feeling.

  It started to rain late Friday afternoon, and it was still raining when Maggie got up Saturday morning. She found the heavy gray, overcast sky somehow comforting, as if it insulated her from the rest of the world. She spent most of the morning standing at the kitchen window watching the rain, thinking about how she’d let herself slip into the rut she was in. There was no one to blame but herself. When she and Bruce got married, she had arranged her life around his. And after the kids were born, they’d always had top priority. But now she had reached a point in her life where she had to take charge of her own well-being—attend some classes, find a hobby, learn another language—something that would expand her dull day-to-day existence. The thought of spending the rest of her life like this was just too damned depressing.

  Sighing heavily, she turned from the window, running her one thumb along the chrome edge of the kitchen table. She wondered why she hadn’t seen all this earlier.

  “Hey, Mom. I’m home.”

  Startled by the sound of her daughter’s voice, she checked her watch. It was one o’clock, for Pete’s sake.

  She went toward the living room. “What are you doing home so early?”

  Bracing her weight against the frame of the front door, Kelly pried one shoe off against the other, then shot her mother a peculiar look. “I told you this morning. The coach is out of town so he cut the practice short.”

  Maggie watched her daughter, trying to recall the conversation. She drew a complete blank. “Oh.”

  Shrugging her backpack off her shoulder, Kelly dropped it by the door, then grinned. “Guess what?”

  Folding her arms and resting against the wall, Maggie managed a small smile. “What?”

  “I stopped at Tony’s on the way home. They were just getting their sign put up—Parnellis’ Auto Shop. It looks really nifty. Anyhow, he said they decided this morning to throw a big open-house party tonight.” She gave a little shiver of excitement, her eyes bright. “And he asked us to come.”

  Experiencing an awful, hollow sensation in her middle, Maggie looked down, running the toe of her shoe along the seam where the hardwood and kitchen tile met. She didn’t know what to say. The last place on earth she wanted to be was at the Parnelli brothers’ open house. Finally she raised her head and looked at her daughter, her expression unsmiling. “Honey,” she said, her tone quiet and placating, “I don’t think that would be a good idea. Something like that is for his customers and the suppliers he deals with. It’s not like a neighborhood block party.”

  Partway out of her jacket, Kelly stopped and stared at her, defiance in her eyes. “It is not. He said Frank and Nancy were going to be there, and he aske
d the Popoloposes. Mrs. Popolopos told me when I stopped in to get the strap on my backpack fixed.”

  A funny nervous flutter developed in Maggie’s throat, and she shifted uncomfortably. The Popoloposes ran the little shop on the corner, and they had been repairing shoes there for as long as Maggie could remember. She dredged up a small smile, trying to reason with her daughter. “Then he probably invited some of the Loop businesspeople, Kell. And I don’t think it would be appropriate for us to go.”

  Her hazel eyes flashing, Kelly snatched up her backpack, slinging it over one shoulder. “Well, if that’s the case, how come we went to Stevie’s open house when she started the fitness center? Tony wouldn’t have invited us if he hadn’t wanted us to come. He’s not like that.” She gave her mother a heated look, then pushed past her. “You always make such a big deal out of everything. It’s just a stupid open house—it’s not an invitation to have tea with the Queen or anything.”

  “Kelly—”

  The teenager turned around, a stubborn look on her face. “Just drop it, okay?” Her chin started to quiver, and Maggie knew she was close to tears. “I just wanted a chance to meet his brother. But never mind. It isn’t appropriate.”

  Not giving Maggie a chance to say anything more, she stormed off into the back entryway, and Maggie heard her thunder down the stairs. A second later, there was a loud slam.

  Dragging her hair back off her face with both hands, Maggie closed her eyes. Kelly never stormed off. That kind of display was something Maggie would expect from Haley, but not Kelly. Feeling suddenly very tired, she went into the living room and flopped down on the sofa. She put her feet on the coffee table, rested her head against the padded back and stared at the ceiling, feeling like something that had crawled in under the door.

  Kelly had her dead to rights, and Maggie knew it. They had gone to Stevie’s open house, and she hadn’t thought a thing about it. And she knew Kelly would give anything to meet Mario Parnelli. Folding her arms, she shifted her gaze and stared out the window. She had said no for all the wrong reasons. It had nothing to do with who was going to be at the open house or whether it was appropriate or not. It was because of one Tony Parnelli. And one damned kiss that had nearly knocked her socks off. She didn’t know why he had done it and wasn’t sure she wanted to know. She did know she got a flock of butterflies in her stomach every time she thought about coming face-to-face with him again. And that was the real reason she didn’t want to go. Which was hardly fair to her daughter.

  Slamming her head against the padded back of the sofa, she closed her eyes again. God, she hated it when she was wrong.

  Chapter 4

  Maggie gave herself an hour to get her backbone together, then she bit the bullet, drove to the supermarket and picked up everything she needed to make a big tray of nachos.

  The house was dead silent when she returned, and she felt like a total rat. After setting the bags of groceries on the kitchen table, she stripped off her rain jacket, then smoothed down her slacks. She wouldn’t blame the kid if she didn’t speak to her for a week.

  Bracing herself for a chilly rebuff, she went downstairs, a combination of nerves and guilt making her insides quaver. Taking a deep breath, she knocked on Kelly’s door. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” she said, her voice scratchy.

  There was no response for a moment, then Kelly opened the door. Without looking at her mother, she turned around and went back into her room, leaving the door open. The teenager sat down at her desk, her back to her mother, hooking her feet on the base of the chair.

  The air practically crackled with tension. Sensing that no pat little apology was going to placate her daughter, Maggie realized she would have to make at least a partial explanation. Her voice was not quite steady when she began, “The reason I said what I did was because I did something really stupid.” Then, as briefly as possible, she told her daughter about the police raid the night she’d called 911.

  Partway through the recounting, Kelly turned around, a look of wide-eyed disbelief on her face. When Maggie got to the part about the cops bringing him out in handcuffs, the stunned look turned into a slow, amazed grin. “You’re kidding!”

  Recalling her own discomfort, Maggie gave her daughter a rueful smile. “No, I’m not kidding. And I still feel pretty dumb about it.” Kelly started to say something, and Maggie held up her hand, wanting to finish. “And you were right, Kell. We did go to Stevie’s open house, and there’s no reason we can’t go to this one.” She managed another rueful smile. “It’s my problem, not yours.”

  Kelly nearly knocked her chair over when she stood up. “Really?”

  With wry amusement still pulling at her mouth, Maggie tipped her head. “Really. But we should take something over. I went out and got everything we need for nachos, so if you feel like grating a couple of pounds of cheese…”

  Kelly flew across the room and hugged her mother, then did a little dance of elation. “I can’t believe it. I’m going to get to meet Mario Parnelli.” She looked at her mother, the wisps of hair that had slid from her French braid framing her face, her eyes sparkling. “He’s so hot, Mom. Wait until you see him. You won’t believe it.”

  Maggie didn’t even want to think about it. His brother was more than she could handle.

  The party was in full swing by the time Maggie and Kelly went over, which suited Maggie just fine. Both bays were open, with people milling around outside. Inside was a madhouse. Hundreds of helium-filled balloons clustered in the rafters in a kaleidoscope of color, with wall-to-wall people and wall-towall noise. Rock-and-roll music blared from a sound system set up on one workbench, and wildly gyrating bodies were dancing to the beat in the second bay. It was the closest thing to bedlam she’d seen in a long time. Taking a deep breath to quell the nervous flutter in her middle, Maggie entered the structure, heartily wishing she was somewhere else.

  The music ended and someone shouted from the far bay, and she smiled a little, wondering how long it would be until old Mrs. Brown from down the street complained. Mrs. Brown and the noise-bylaw officer were on intimate terms. The elderly woman had once complained to Maggie because her lawn sprinkler was too loud.

  Handing Kelly the huge tray of nachos with all the trimmings, she pointed to the table of food set up along one wall, then gave her daughter a little push, not even trying to talk above the din.

  Frank Lucciano appeared at her side, his face flushed and damp with perspiration, a bottle of beer in his hand. He yelled into her ear. “Some party, huh?”

  She looked at him and nodded, amused by his state. Obviously he had been dancing—Frank never broke into a sweat over anything else. He ranted and raved, but he did not sweat. A definite plus when dealing with Revenue Canada.

  His hand on her shoulder, he pointed to one corner with his bottle of beer. There were some tables and chairs set up, and a whole contingency of people from the neighborhood were there—George Perkins, the butcher, and his wife; Mr. and Mrs. Popolopos; Big Bertha, who ran the coffee shop; the Gorskys, who owned the bakery.

  Relieved to see some familiar faces, Maggie made her way through the crush of people. Nancy Lucciano spotted her, welcoming her with a big grin. “I hope you brought your earplugs. I think this bunch is trying to bring the roof down.”

  Dropping into an empty chair at the back of the table, Maggie shook her head when Frank held up his beer, his expression questioning. She released a pent-up breath, the knot of nerves finally letting go. This was going to be okay. She’d got herself in a panic over nothing.

  Relaxing back in her chair, she studied the crowd. There was everything from biker types to grandmas, and they were all clearly having a good time. The music started up again, and she spotted Kelly with Scott in tow, heading toward the designated dance area. Maggie’s heart gave a painful lurch when she caught a glimpse of dark hair in the crowd. The person turned, and she experienced an equally disturbing feeling when it wasn’t Tony. She looked away, focusing her attention on Kelly and S
cott, a sudden sense of aloneness sweeping over her. She shouldn’t have come. Her instincts had told her this was a bad idea.

  Maggie stuck it out for a half hour. Then someone put on a CD of old hits that had been popular when she was in high school, and the rush of nostalgia, on top of everything else, was just too much. She’d never felt so alone in her life. It was as if the music had scraped off some protective shell, exposing years of accumulated loneliness, and it had all come together in one big, aching lump. She knew she couldn’t stay there one minute longer or she’d really make a fool of herself.

  Pleading a headache, she excused herself from the group at the table, then slipped out through the milling crowd. She couldn’t see Kelly anywhere, but Frank was standing outside the big bay door, another beer in his hand. He grinned at her. “Coming to keep me company?”

  Suddenly cold, Maggie shivered in her light sweater. She shook her head, her whole face feeling unnaturally stiff. “No. I’m going home, Frank.”

  “What?” he demanded, looking totally scandalized. “You can’t go home yet. You just got here.”

  She managed a small smile. “I’m getting a headache. I’m going home to bed.”

  He gave her an intent look. “You sure that’s all? You don’t look so hot, Mag.”

  She lifted one corner of her mouth. “I never look hot, Frank.” She indicated the second bay. “I can’t see Kelly, and I don’t want to fight my way through that crowd. Would you mind letting her know I’ve gone home? And tell her I’ll leave the back door unlocked for her.”

  He nodded brusquely and gave her shoulder a little shake. “Will do. You go on, and don’t worry about her. I’ll make sure she gets home all right.”

  She met his gaze. “Thanks, Frank,” she said, her voice uneven.

  Frank was watching her, a thoughtful expression in his eyes. “Something bothering you, Maggie?”