But something was wrong. Tandi wasn’t talking, and that bothered him. He didn’t know what was on her mind. Unless Tandi opened up, he wouldn’t know if he had a chance. He had noticed when she came into the living room back at the house, that she didn’t look too happy. Had she changed her mind and not wanted to come out with him tonight?
Whenever she could, without being obvious, Tandi stole a look at Jared. How long had it been since she had seen him looking this good? Hell, how long had it been since she’d seen him at all? Jared always wore a suit, and he was always groomed, but there was something different about the way he looked tonight. His hair was cut close the way she liked it. His mustache was smaller but impeccably trimmed. In fact, other than being older, he looked as he did the day they married, and like the day they married, she felt weak every time he touched her. When he put his hand on the small of her back as he took her to their table, she thought, how right this was. And it was. This was all she had been asking him for, a little romance, a little attention. She should not have had to leave him to get this.
“You seem so far away,” Jared said. “A penny for your thoughts.”
She smiled timidly.
“I know, it’s corny.”
Tandi nodded.
Jared picked up his fork and put it down again. “I’m glad you came out with me tonight.”
“I’m glad you asked me,” she said, meaning it. Despite her bitter feelings about Evonne and the memory of her laying in bed with Jared, she was determined that those feelings and memories would not spoil her evening. Tandi began eating her dinner of grilled salmon and asparagus as Jared put two roasted mushrooms from his plate onto hers. She looked at him.
Belatedly realizing what he had done, Jared blanched. “I’m sorry. I guess old habits are hard to break.” He reached across with his fork to take them back.
Tandi blocked her plate with her hand. “I still like mushrooms.”
“Good.”
They finished their meal in silence as words were yet to be found that would easily flow between them.
“Michael Jared would have loved this,” Tandi said, setting her spoon down in her empty glacé dish.
“MJ.”
“Yes, I know. I’m still trying to get used to it.”
“You will. But you know he eats ice cream every night.”
“Jared,” Tandi said reproachfully.
“I don’t let him take much,” he defended. “Besides, he said you would let him have it.”
“Not every night, and he knows that.”
Jared smiled. “He’s slick.”
“He’s spoiled. He’s been getting away with a lot—lately.”
Jared slid his half-eaten strawberry glace a few inches away. He was never one for desserts.
As if on cue, the waiter appeared and collected both their dishes. “Would you like anything else? A demitasse perhaps, or a glass of wine?”
“Two demitasses,” Jared said without consulting Tandi. He dared because he didn’t want the evening to end.
Tandi smiled in a secret way. She didn’t mind that Jared ordered for her. It was like old times, but she didn’t dwell on that. Those days were behind them. But Jared drinking a demitasse? That was a new one on her. He drank black coffee, but he used to say that a demitasse was a joke. But she understood what he was doing and didn’t remind him that he once said that the cup belonged in a doll’s house.
“Daina must have promised MJ something to get him to stay over at her house,” she said.
“Actually, they’re not at her house. They’re up in the Catskills.”
“Daina didn’t tell me she was going up there.”
“It was a last-minute decision. She and Herb went up there to get the house ready for summer.”
“But tomorrow’s Saturday. I told Michael—MJ—we’d do something together.”
“I know. He said to tell you to have a good time tonight, and that he’ll see you early Sunday morning. That’s when Daina’s bringing him back.”
Tandi gave Jared a knowing look.
He knew what she was thinking, and she was right. He, Daina, and MJ had planned the evening. It had even been MJ’s idea that he kiss Tandi when he gave her the roses. He had kissed her on the cheek and not on the mouth as MJ had instructed. He didn’t want to start the evening off wrong.
The waiter returned.
Jared watched as Tandi accepted her demitasse. She thanked the waiter with a gracious nod. He still liked her style, and he still enjoyed being with her. Why hadn’t he done this for her all along without feeling like she was putting too much demand on his time? It wasn’t like he had to dig ditches. Simply sitting and eating and talking to his wife was as easy as breathing. Looking back, he had been overly selfish with his time while Tandi had always been so selfless in her giving of her time and all that she did for him. She had every right to walk out. Acknowledging that truth saddened him. He began slowly turning his demitasse cup in a circle.
This time it was Tandi who asked, “Private thought?”
He stopped turning his cup. “I was thinking about MJ,” he lied. “He gave up his weekend with you because he thought it best we go out together. He thinks we should date.”
Musingly, Tandi sipped her demitasse. What she had been afraid of was happening. Michael Jared was growing up without her. His outlook on life was changing. Apparently, he had gotten over his angst about his parents being sexual beings.
“I told MJ to not worry about us,” Jared said, picking up his cup. His hand and his lips practically swallowed his cup when he turned it up to his mouth.
Tandi smiled to herself when Jared looked as if he was going to swallow the tiny cup. He quietly set his cup down in its saucer. It made not a clank. He watched her. He could see that Tandi’s eyes were twinkling. Something was making her smile. He wondered if it were him. He wondered if this was a sign that she might forgive him.
“Tandi, I know I promised I wouldn’t talk about certain things, but do you think you’ll be moving out of your father’s house soon? MJ hates that you’re there.”
“Actually, I’m waiting for an apartment to come through.”
Jared’s heart sank.
“The health aides that are with us now seem to have Daddy pretty much tamed, especially Carline. How she’s doing it, I don’t know, but he hasn’t gone off on her. So, it’s a matter of time.”
“You don’t have to look for an apartment. You have a home.”
There was no mistaking what Jared meant, but for Tandi, going back home wasn’t just going back to a house. It meant going back to Jared, and at this point, she didn’t know if that was what she wanted.
“Tandi, I’m sorry I said the house was mine. It’s ours.”
“Jared, you promised we wouldn’t talk tonight about us. You—”
“I said I wouldn’t pressure you and I won’t, but, Tandi, it’s killing me to not talk about what went wrong. You left me. You cut me off. You didn’t give me one opportunity to tell you how I felt about that.”
“That’s not true. Months and months before I tried to talk to you, but you weren’t listening.”
“Looking back, perhaps I wasn’t. Did you read any of my letters?”
Tandi’s silence was her answer.
Feeling badly, Jared refrained from asking why not. “Look, my need to talk to you is stronger than my promise to not pressure you. What I’ve been telling you in those letters is that I realize that I’ve been wrong.”
“Jared, to be fair, there’s more to my leaving home than you and me or even the mistakes we made. To tell you the truth, I hadn’t been happy for a very long time with my life, period.”
“So why didn’t you tell me that? Or maybe you did and I didn’t hear you. Did you?”
“No. I don’t think I knew at the time that I was unhappy with my life. I was too busy blaming you. Since I left home, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and . . . re-evaluating.”
“What have you come up with?”
“For one, I was bored—for years. Jared, I don’t like selling real estate.”
“You did in the beginning. What changed it for you?”
“I don’t know. I guess brick and wood just don’t do it for me. Don’t get me wrong, some of the homes are architecturally beautiful, but I think I need to be doing something that I like that I can make a living at. And right now, I just don’t know what that is.”
“Sure you do.”
She arched her brow. “I do?”
“Yes, and it still has to do with houses.”
“Then, I don’t know—”
“Tandi, when we first met, there was only one kind of magazine you’d buy, and you bought every one of that type on the market. Do you need any more of a clue?”
No she didn’t. Home decorating and interior design were her passion. “Wow. I forgot all about that.”
“As I see it, you got into the wrong area of real estate. Your heart is in interior design. You used to want to be an interior decorator, remember?”
Tandi hadn’t thought about that in years. An interior decorator was what she wanted to be from the time she was a teenager rearranging her bedroom every other month. She had planned on going to the Fashion Institute of Technology for interior design when she graduated high school. She had a flair for colors and a taste for fine furniture. It had been her dream to decorate the homes of the rich and famous so that the lack of money would not stymie her artistic expression. That dream was set aside when she first moved out of Sporty’s house on her own and she had to make a living. Then along came Jared and Michael Jared, and that dream was forgotten. Now that Jared had reminded her that she once had a passion at all, Tandi began to feel it in her soul.
Jared saw the twinkle of inspiration in Tandi’s eyes. “You can still follow that dream, you know.”
She felt invigorated. She was excited. “But I’ll have to go back to school.”
“That’s a good idea. I’ll support you in whatever it takes to get you there,” Jared said, daring to hope she would allow him to do that for her. Even more than that, he didn’t want her to become any more ensconced into the arms of the man she was seeing than she already was.
“Jared, I can do this on my own. I don’t need your money.”
“I know you can. I just want you to know that I’m here for you. I’ll help out in any way I can.”
“Thank you, but I’ll be all right.”
Tandi was pushing him away. He was afraid she would. It could only mean that she wasn’t going to let him back into her life. “Can I ask you a question?”
She automatically put up her defenses. Whenever that question was asked, the question that followed was often loaded.
“Are you serious about the guy you’re seeing?”
Loaded and fired. “What did Daina tell you?”
“Just that you had a friend.”
Big mouth.
“So, is he just a friend?”
“Jared, we’re not having this discussion.”
He sat back. Maybe it was just as well. He really didn’t want to know all the details anyway. Besides there was something he needed to say. “I never wanted to sleep with Evonne.”
The mere mention of Evonne’s name put a sour taste in Tandi’s mouth.
“I won’t make excuses, I won’t play it down. I just want you to know I recognize that I made a mistake. What I want is for you to forgive me, so that—”
“Jared, I didn’t come out with you tonight to put you on any guilt trips or to strip you of your pride. I—”
“You’re not. It’s just that I know how much I hurt you.”
“Jared, I’ve totally forgiven you for Evonne.”
Amazed, he could only look at Tandi and wonder how.
“Ironically, it was something Evonne said that got me to forgive you.”
“What was that?”
“She said if you were hers, she would have treated you a whole lot better than I did. And it made me think about our life together and how I treated you.”
“You weren’t so bad.”
“I could have done better.”
“And so could I. Many times I wasn’t there for you.”
“Jared, would you please let me shoulder my share of the blame?” Tandi asked, tearing. “We were in this marriage together, good or bad. We both had something to do with the outcome; however, I know what my faults were and so do you probably. I—”
“Tandi, but you did the best you could when I—”
“Okay. You want some blame? Well, Jared, I do blame you for one thing.”
He was taken aback but hadn’t he asked for it? He waited.
“I blame you for making me feel so unloved, so unwanted.”
“Tandi, I swear to God, I didn’t know I was doing that. I thought if my practice was a success, then everything else in our lives was okay. Obviously, I got that wrong. I hope you’ll let me make it up to you.”
“I don’t know if you can. It may be too late for us.”
“It’s never too late. We can start over. We can date if you want, whatever it takes.”
From the moment Jared gave her the roses earlier, Tandi was close to crying. Daina had said Jared wanted her back with a passion. This she could see and feel all evening, and she couldn’t say that knowing this didn’t make her feel good.
Jared wanted to hold Tandi. “It’s a beautiful night. Would you like to walk a little?”
She nodded.
Again, Jared was hopeful that all wasn’t lost. He signaled the waiter for the bill. If God was watching, this evening would never end.
50
Jared was feeling good. The evening was turning out better than he had hoped and what’s more, the weather was cooperating. Rain had been predicted. As yet, not a drop had fallen. The night was refreshingly crisp and picture postcard clear. Only the brilliance of street lights and spotlights in Rockefeller Center outshone the full moon high above St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It had been a tepid spring and now that it was the middle of June, it was finally beginning to feel like summer was on its way. It was a perfect night for strolling in Manhattan. In fact, Jared had forgotten that he liked strolling in the city after the maddening work crowd had fled and left the sidewalks to tourists, native strollers, entertainment seekers, and to diners hungry for tasty treats of every nation.
Side by side Jared and Tandi strolled up Fifth Avenue, neither their shoulders nor their hands touching, although Jared itched to take her hand in his but dared not presume she wanted him to. As they started across Fiftieth Street, he put his hand on her arm just under her elbow.
Tandi liked that Jared was being the perfect gentleman. His touch was nice. It was familiar.
They continued, not talking, just enjoying the walk. From time to time their arms brushed against each other, making each aware that the other’s touch was electric. If Jared had only known that if he slipped his arm around Tandi like he used to so many years ago, that her wall of determination to not give in to him was in jeopardy of crumbling like dried out toast. And that made Tandi mad. She wasn’t ready to step back into a marriage that frustrated her and made her feel empty inside. She couldn’t believe how comfortable she was being with Jared. Emotionally, she felt herself seesawing between being guarded and wanting to feel his arms around her. Coming out with Jared tonight was supposed to get them talking again. That’s all. She wasn’t supposed to be falling back in love with him. Wrapping her shawl more snug around her shoulders, Tandi picked up her pace.
Jared quickly matched Tandi’s stride. “What’s wrong?” He had sensed her attitude change ever since he touched her.
“Nothing.”
“Are you angry with me?”
“I wish I were.”
“Why?”
“Ah, it’s not worth talking about.”
“Isn’t not talking where our problems started?”
Tandi stopped. “Can we please not try and drag all of my demons out tonight? There is on
ly so much I can handle right now.” She zipped off again.
Again, Jared matched Tandi’s stride, all the while glimpsing the confusion in her face—the way she rolled her lips inward, the way she kept frowning. They continued in silence. After a block Tandi slowed down. Jared followed her lead. Although they still walked side by side, they walked more than a foot apart. Jared felt that his arm should have been around Tandi’s waist. She should have been nestled deep in the crook of his arm, by now he should have kissed her at least once. What they should have been doing, they couldn’t, not when there was a strained awkwardness between them still. Maybe it was up to him to make the first move.
“It’s almost ten-thirty,” he said. “We could catch a jam session uptown at The Blue Note. You game?” They started across the street.
No was what she was supposed to be saying, but, “Sure. Why not?” was what Tandi heard herself say.
“Good. Let’s go back for the car,” he said, pleased she hadn’t turned him down.
A few feet from the curb, together, Jared and Tandi about-faced and started back across the street. Without warning, a yellow taxi cut around the corner . . .
“Watch out!” someone shouted.
. . . coming close enough to Tandi to swipe the lower fringes of her long shawl with its rear side panel as it speedily glided past her.
“Hey!” Jared snatched Tandi back. His heart was racing.
Tandi gasped, “Oh, my God.” She fell back against Jared.
Jared wrapped his arms around her, holding her protectively against his body. Tandi’s legs felt wobbly. She clung to Jared.
Several people gathered around as the taxi sped on, its motor roaring as it cut in and out of traffic going down Fifth Avenue.
“Did you see that?” a man asked excitedly.
“Yeah. That maniac could have killed you, lady!”
“Miss, are you all right?” a woman asked Tandi.
She really wasn’t. She shuddered.
Jared tightened his embrace, trying to still Tandi’s trembling. He could almost feel her heart pounding in unison with his own. “Are you hurt?”
Closing her eyes, Tandi lay her head against Jared’s chest. She slipped her arms around his waist and grabbed fistfuls of his jacket.
Distant Lover Page 29