Yes, I Do

by Gwynne Forster

  “Ah, sweetheart,” he murmured, “can’t you see that we’re going to make it? We have these little misunderstandings and disagreements, but we always ride over them, don’t we?” She snuggled against him.

  “We’re not having five children, August.”

  “I know, honey. I know. You agreed to three, and I’m willing to compromise.”

  She stepped back and glared at him.

  “I didn’t hear myself agree. We’ll take this up again when our second is two years old.”

  “Okay. Okay. At least, I’ll get to be a father.” She had never realized that a loving relationship with a man could be so sweet and that laughing with him could be so wonderfully satisfying. August made her laugh. And he made her heart skip beats.

  August figured he had to learn how to be happy. He had achieved success as a corporate executive, had the respect of his associates and employees, and the people back in Wallace, North Carolina, thought he had spun gold wings. Whenever he walked into Wallace’s library, Mrs. McCullen, the librarian, ushered him into the computer room that he’d funded and introduced the children who worked and studied there to their benefactor. All of that made him feel great, but it wasn’t a part of him. The woman in his arms was a part of him; he could feel it. But he wasn’t sure of it, an ephemeral quality about their relationship wouldn’t let him enjoy it to the fullest. He’d believe his good fortune when he saw their marriage certificate. He shifted his attention to Susan when he heard his name.

  “August, I want to go to the opera. If I get two tickets, will you go with me to see La Boheme?” Her surprisingly seductive voice told him that she wasn’t sure of their relationship, either. If she had been, she’d know that he’d do whatever he could to make her happy.

  “I’ll get the tickets. When do you want to go?” He made a note of that. Since she thought she had to seduce him into taking her to an opera, he’d better put her straight.

  “I love opera. I learned to appreciate it from the Saturday afternoon broadcasts that I’ve followed since my childhood, but I’ve never been to one. I’ll look forward to this.” Joy suffused him as he savored her smile and obvious delight.

  “A little thing like this can make you so happy?” he asked.

  “Well…we’ve got something else in common, something we can enjoy together without getting into a fight or either of us having to compromise.”

  He grinned. “Don’t mistake me for a highbrow, now. I love country music, too. Some of the best guitarists in the world play country.” Here we go, he thought, as her smile dissolved into a frown.

  “You can’t sell it to me.” She inclined her head toward her left shoulder and lowered her eyelids slightly in that way he loved. “If you want to hear spell-binding popular guitar music,” she admonished him, “listen to some good classical jazz—Charlie Christian or Freddie Green, Wes Montgomery or Laurindo Almeida. Now, that’s guitar playing. Those guys knew what to do with six strings.”

  He put a serious expression on his face. “I wouldn’t know, being unfamiliar with the guitar.” At least she had the grace to appear less sure of herself.

  “But you said… Oh,” she murmured, remembering that he’d studied guitar for many years, “I guess I can’t tell you who knows how to play a guitar.”

  “Sure you can,” he said with a shrug of his left shoulder, “but you don’t have to be right, you…” The roll of paper towels sailed straight at him, but he caught it, tossed it on the sink and went after her.

  “Throw things at your future husband, will you? Well, we’ll see about that,” he said, reaching toward her. Warned by the fire she must have seen in his eyes, she raced down the hallway, but he charged after her, grabbed her as she whirled into the living room and tumbled with her onto her big velvet sofa. Gales of laughter pealed from her throat while he mercilessly tickled her side. He watched, transfixed, as her giggles dissolved into sudden and sober silence when she opened her eyes to the passion he knew his face betrayed.

  She squirmed beneath him, and his response was swift, hard and hot. I’m going to get him this time, she told herself, when heat pooled in the pit of her belly and shot to the center of her passion. He turned to his side bringing her with him but, as she struggled in the grip of desire, his effort to slow them down only vaguely penetrated her consciousness. When he didn’t respond to her parted lips, she wet his mouth with her tongue and luxuriated in his hoarse groan as he opened up to her. Wanting more and demanding it, she threw her right leg across his hip but, with what sounded like a wrenching sob, he moved her away from him.

  “Susan,” he said, sitting up straight and seeming to drag the words out of himself, “we’re going to wait.”

  She sat up and moved closer to him. “Can I expect you to stop doing this to me after February fourteenth?” She tried not to be vexed at his raised eyebrow that suggested he couldn’t imagine what her question was about.

  “Leaving me hanging like this. You know what I mean.” His tender hug made up for it a little, but not much.

  “Aren’t you beginning to see why I’m holding back. Think how much closer we are now than when you first brought it up. The closer we are and the deeper our feelings for each other the first time we make love, the better it will be and the more binding, too. I’m flattered. I’d lie if I said I wasn’t, and especially because it’s me and not just the physical relief that you want.” She poked his shoulder playfully.

  “I’m cooperating, aren’t I?”

  “Just barely,” he muttered.

  “Well, it’s taking some effort on my part.”

  He gazed at her, as though surprised. “What does that mean?”

  “It means that I am not so naive that I don’t know how to seduce you. That’s what.” He wasn’t going to fool her with his look of solemnity, his pious sincerity.

  “I’m glad to hear it,” was all he said. Then he looked down at her left hand and his eyes seemed to gleam with happiness. “That’s not so bad, is it, honey?”

  “What?”

  “Wearing my ring. It’s not like I’d asked you to wear a big, bright sign on your forehead or anything.” She had to laugh, he could think of the most ridiculous things.

  “It gets a lot of attention. The first day I wore it, would you believe a line formed at my desk? The consensus at the office is that you have elegant taste.” She paused, weighing a decision. “August, will you stop by my office tomorrow afternoon? I’d like to introduce you to my colleagues.” She should have suggested that earlier, she realized, when the change in his demeanor reflected frank pride.

  August called Grace and asked her to be in front of his office building at noon the next day.

  “I found that clipping,” Grace said, as soon as she heard his voice, “and it’s got all the information you need. You don’t even have to tell Susan a thing about it. You can do it on your own, it says here. But you be sure and make that deadline, now. You hear? My second sense tells me—”

  He didn’t want to hear about her second sense. “All right. I’ll do it, but it’s just between us. I don’t want Susan to be disappointed.” So far, he hadn’t found Grady, he told her in reply to her question, but he had an excellent lead, and his P.I. was currently checking on it.

  “Shucks,” she said. “Give me his christened name, birthday, date, time, and place, and I’ll bring you something tomorrow. No need to wait on an investigator when he can’t tell you anything that I can’t.” He did, adding that his mother had said Grady was born at high noon.

  He had a sensation of being suspended in midair, when he saw the look of excitement on Grace’s face as she greeted him at noon the next day. Her whole body seemed to vibrate and glow in contrast with her normally closed face and phlegmatic demeanor. She opened the front door of the taxi for him, something she hadn’t previously done.

  “It’s him, all right,” she said, dispensing with preliminaries. “His chart says he’s looking for you, and my second sense backs that up. He’s going to find y
ou before the full moon.”

  “When is that?”

  “Next one is February the eleventh. From the looks of this, you ought to be heading toward western North Carolina, somewhere around Pinehurst, or maybe eastern Tennessee. If that’s where your P.I. went, you’re on the right track. Go for it!”

  August pulled at the scarf around his neck and loosened his tie. With trembling fingers, he took a few tissues from the box on Grace’s dashboard and wiped his forehead. “Slow down over there, please, Grace. I need a couple of minutes before I go for Susan. I’m trying not to hope too much, but my investigator went to Ashville, and that’s in western North Carolina. I’ve had so many disappointments that I can’t let myself expect too much. I haven’t married, bought a house, or even a car. My earnings have gone for necessities and for my search for Grady. I’ve put everything that I could into finding him—the only kin I know about. Twenty-six long years. I wonder what he’ll be like, how he turned out.”

  Grace patted his hand. “You needn’t worry—he’s a respectable citizen.”

  “I was prepared to love him, no matter what, but I’m glad to know he made it. Thank God, and thank you, Grace.” He shook his head slowly, unable to believe that the agony was nearing an end. He recalled something that Grace had said minutes earlier.

  “You said something about a second sense. Are you clairvoyant?” He noticed that she appeared ill at ease.

  “I don’t tell people about that, because it makes them uncomfortable with me, but since you asked, very much so. I was that way growing up, and I didn’t have sense enough to keep my mouth shut about it. The upshot was people treated me like I was a circus freak. I studied astrology because a woman told me that was more scientific. I don’t know. I use both together, and I’ve been able to help a lot of people. I didn’t manage to go any farther than high school, and I didn’t want to wait tables or tend a bar, so I figured driving my own taxi was my best chance of meeting a lot of people and helping as many as I could. Of course, I make a good living at it, and I ain’t sneezing at that. No sirree.”

  That night, August decided to enter the Rainbow Room contest. What could he lose? Maybe, if he showed some originality, he’d stand a chance of winning. He wanted Susan to have her dream, and he wanted to see her in a long white wedding gown.

  He wrote: I dreamed of a wedding in the Rainbow Room, because

  I wanted a little church wedding

  Before flying with my bride to the moon

  But on a New Year’s Eve long, long ago

  She fell in love with the Rainbow Room.

  She says she’ll marry in a gay pants suit

  And hurry back to her office by noon

  She wouldn’t think of wearing satin and lace

  Unless she wears it in the Rainbow Room.

  She longs to relive that star-spangled night

  When the world was hers, and her youth full bloom

  She’ll even take her vows in a white bridal gown

  If she can take them in the Rainbow Room.

  He put the letter in an envelope, considered crossing his fingers and decided a prayer made more sense. On his way to Susan’s apartment, he dropped the letter into the mailbox.

  August hadn’t objected when she told him that since he’d gotten fourth row orchestra seats for the performance of La Boheme at the Metropolitan Opera House, she’d like to wear a long dress. “Fine with me,” he’d said, offhand. So she dressed in a figure-hugging red velvet sheath supported by thin shoulder straps and her ample bosom, piled her hair on her head, and surveyed the results. Not bad. She barely heard August’s piercing whistle when she opened the door, nor did she notice his appreciative comment on her looks. In a black tuxedo with a pleated silk shirt and gray and black accessories, August Jackson was spellbinding. Not certain whether her eyes deceived her, she blinked them several times, as she tried to reconcile this urban sophisticate with the gentle, homespun man she thought she knew. She took a deep breath, invited him in and went for her coat, all the while musing over the picture he made. This guy was poster material. Well, she consoled herself, at least he didn’t behave as if he knew it.

  “Where’s your coat,” she asked as he helped her into hers.

  “I don’t have a black chesterfield,” he told her, “but I won’t get a cold. A car’s waiting for us right outside.”

  Her eyebrows arched in spite of her effort to hide her surprise, but he laughed, taking it in stride.

  “I do know a few things, honey, including how to dress. The first thing I did when Amos and I started to turn a profit was to concentrate on how to present myself in all kinds of situations. I hate putting on these things, but let me tell you it’s worth it to see you looking like this. You’re so pretty.”

  Only he had applied that word to her since she was a small girl. She wanted to put her arms around him and hug him to her; he’d blindsided her, poleaxed her. He looked down at her, and his lips began to smile. She had to close her eyes, because she would be besotted for sure if she gazed at him until that smile reached his eyes.

  “Come on, let’s go,” she urged. He assisted her into the back seat of a waiting chauffeured Lincoln Town Car, joined her, opened the bar, and poured her a glass of champagne.

  “I’m going to faint,” she said, her voice low and breathy.

  “Don’t you like champagne?”

  His grin told her that he was well aware of her problem, so she gathered her wits as best she could and sipped the icy wine. Throughout the performance, during the intermission, and on the ride back home, she saw an August who displayed every nuance of good manners and elegant taste. And at the end of the evening, she couldn’t say who had sung the role of Mimi or how she’d sounded.

  “You’re amazing,” she told him, as he left her.

  He turned and favored her with his high-powered grin.

  “There’s a first and only time for everything. Wouldn’t you say?”

  She had to laugh, because he’d just told her not to expect that treatment often. Maybe not again.

  Two days later, August kept his promise to meet Susan’s colleagues. She took him first to meet the firm’s president, a genial man of Norwegian descent, who gave them his blessings. August Jackson was as comfortable in that setting as she, and more than one of her male colleagues frankly deferred to him. It didn’t surprise her that Oscar Hicks proved the exception.

  “Man, I’m glad you’re taking Susan out of the running for partner. She’s a mean piece of competition, and I won’t stand a chance as long as she wants a shot at it.” He talked on and on, Susan observed, apparently oblivious to August’s failure to respond.

  “What exactly do you mean by that comment?” August finally said in a voice iced with sarcasm.

  “Well,” Oscar said, apparently less sure of himself now. “She’ll soon start a family and, well, you know.”

  He cautioned himself not to show his temper. “And that’s your business?”

  “Well, no…of course not,” Oscar replied, as he edged toward the door. “Good to meet you.” Susan watched his departing back and couldn’t restrain a laugh.

  “Milquetoast, if I ever saw any,” she said, as much to herself as to August. “Oscar knows a man when he sees one. No wonder he got out of here when you challenged him.” She didn’t let August see her misgivings. For the first time since she had agreed to marry him, doubts as to the wisdom of it and fear of probable consequences buried themselves into her consciousness. She didn’t know what she’d do if she missed out on the chance to become a partner, to see Andrews added to Pettersen, Geier and Howard.

  Three evenings later, Susan sat up in bed putting rollers in her hair and musing over August’s inconsistent behavior. Whenever he had an option, August usually chose the traditional, the old-fashioned. So simple a thing as how visitors would announce themselves had been an issue between them. She had wanted a doorbell and an intercom, but he claimed that was too unfriendly, and they’d settled for chimes. He wante
d a house full of children, but when their furniture was delivered to their Tarrytown home the day before, he hadn’t asked her to take the day off to receive it. He had done that himself. Maybe he wouldn’t expect her to stay at home for months after each of their children was born. She hoped he’d be understanding about that. She didn’t want to give up that partnership; she’d worked too hard and too long for it.

  August returned the phone to its cradle and propped himself against the wall with the help of his right elbow. His left hand went to his chest as though to still the furious pounding of his heart. After all these years, was he finally going to see Grady? He didn’t know if he could stand a disappointment such as he’d experienced when he’d gone to Washington to see a man who might have been his brother. His private investigator claimed to be ninety percent certain this time, and Grace’s charts were never wrong, but there was still a chance that his hopes would be futile. His entire life had been one triumph after another over adversity, and he didn’t fear his ability to withstand it. But this was his heart. He’d loved his little brother and had protected him as best he could against the cruelty and unfairness that they endured in foster homes. But one day their foster father had promised Grady the beating of his life, and the boy had disappeared. Soon after that, August had been sent to another home, and Grady couldn’t have found him without going to the authorities. He’d been looking for his brother ever since, and he knew he’d never be a whole person until he found him. He dialed Susan’s number.

  “Susan, my investigator says he’s found my brother in Ashville, North Carolina. I’m going there tomorrow morning, and I want you to go with me. Will you?” He didn’t know what he’d do if she said she couldn’t make it; he needed her, and he needed to know that she’d be there for him whenever he needed her just as he would be for her. He needed some evidence that meeting his needs was important to her. Annoyed and uneasy at her long silence, he didn’t try to hide his testiness.