Dare to Dream

by Modean Moon

  "Do you want your cheeseburger with onions or without?" he asked as he whipped the little car into a parking space at the drive-in restaurant.

  "Reservations?" she asked dryly.

  "Of course. Didn't you notice that this choice space was waiting for us? With or without?"

  "With," she said, and she felt a smile tugging at the corners of her lips.

  They sat in companionable silence and watched sparrows busily building nests in the colorful corrugated metal awning overhead. Easy music from the radio blended with and muted traffic, noises, and the warm May breeze kept exhaust fumes from the passing vehicles at bay.

  When the food arrived, he pulled his briefcase from the backseat and placed it between them, covering it with paper napkins and arranging the sandwiches and the cardboard boats of onion rings and french fries on the improvised table.

  He bit hungrily into his sandwich. "There's nothing quite like a Number Four with cheese," he said appreciatively. "Except maybe a hot dog from that little place downtown."

  "Or maybe your 'cheap imitation' eggs Benedict?" she prompted, laughing. "How do you sustain yourself eating as many fast foods as you do?"

  "It's easy." He grinned at her. "It's really much simpler keeping track of nutrition since they knocked the seven basic food groups down to four. I have here," he pointed to his sandwich, "a serving from the meat group, a serving from the cereal group, and a serving from the fruit and vegetable group. And here," he took a long drink from his strawberry malt, "a serving from the dairy group. What more could I ask for? And besides, I don't always have time to stop for anything more substantial."

  "Still, you do occasionally need real food," she said, laughing and reaching for an onion ring just as he did. Their fingers met. Playfully, he pushed her hand away and held the onion ring up to her mouth.

  "I have an idea," he said. She hesitated, looking at the onion ring and then at him from under a quizzically cocked brow.

  "Go ahead." He chuckled. "Take a bite."

  Only when she had bitten off a bite of the proffered morsel and started to swallow did he continue. "Marry me. That way you can make sure that I'm properly fed."

  The food lodged in her throat. She stared at him wildly and saw that in spite of his lightly spoken words he studied her intently. She grabbed for her lemonade and swallowed deeply, searching for words.

  "That's hardly a reason for marriage," she said finally.

  "Need a better reason, do I?" he asked lightly, still studying her. "I don't suppose you'd consider just moving in with me—"

  "Nick!"

  "No. I didn't think so. Are you through with that?" He pointed to her forgotten sandwich. When she nodded, he tore bits from the crust and tossed them to the waiting sparrows. "It will have to be marriage, then. Your bed is comfortable, but it's about six inches too short. The only way I can see to avoid terminal backache is to take you home with me."

  She looked at him in dismay, shaking her head, not knowing whether she wanted to laugh or to cry.

  "Still not good enough?" he asked. When she didn't answer, he went on. "I guess I could try guilt. How about—you've had your way with me and now it's time to make an honest man of me?"

  His tone teased, and yet—and yet, something told her he was hiding behind that tone, knowing how fast she would run from a formal proposal. Still, his light attitude gave her a graceful way out of a difficult refusal.

  "Sorry," she said, giving him a mock grimace. "But you know how us liberated women are."

  "Too bad," he said, grinning.

  Thank God, she thought. He's going to play along as though it really were a game.

  "I would have made it worth your while too." He gathered up the remnants of lunch and stashed them on the waiting tray.

  "Oh?" She laughed outright at his exaggerated disappointment. "Just what had you planned to offer me?"

  "Why, a baby and a new pair of shoes every year. What else?"

  She choked and then took another deep swallow of her lemonade. "Every year?"

  "You're right," he said as he started the car and backed from the parking place. "That is too much. You wouldn't need that many shoes."

  He glided the Mercedes skillfully onto the Interstate Highway and drove toward the heart of town, but when they drew even with the skyline of the business district, he eased into the left lane and soon they were speeding toward the west, away from the city.

  "Where are you taking me?" she asked, suddenly suspicious.

  "It's a surprise."

  "Nick! Be serious. Where are you taking me?"

  He turned to her with a grin. "I'm taking you to meet my family."

  Her smile faded. "Your family? But you told me they live on the West Coast."

  "They do. They came in late last night." He seemed not to notice the edge of panic in her voice. "They're at my place on Keystone, but only for one day. My brother's got to get back to L. A. for an arbitration hearing. I told Tim he shouldn't have checked in with his office until he was ready to go home, but he already had. You know how you lawyers are."

  "Your brother is an attorney?" she asked in a small voice as she played for time to quieten her tumultuous thoughts.

  "Labor law. He's pretty good too. Too good. Now I'll never get him to move back here. And Mom insists on being near her grandson." He gave a delighted laugh. "I wonder if she's gotten Timmie into dancing school yet? Janice would go along with it. She and Mom are on the same wavelength. None of that feuding in-law business there."

  He reached for her hand and clasped it. Dani's hand felt numb in his. She stared blindly at the passing scenery. Why was he taking her to meet his family? They'd only known each other a few weeks. He had no business thrusting her into the middle of a family reunion. They would all know that she had no right to be there.

  "You'll like my mother," Nick told her. "She's a little old-fashioned, but that's the worst thing I can say about her."

  Dani closed her eyes and shrank back against the seat. Rob's words floated around her. I wish you'd try harder to like my mother. I know the two of you would get along if you'd just work at it. And she had worked at it. She had tried to please that woman for eleven years, only to have—only to have—

  Dani was unable to push back the memory of her last meeting with Rob's mother. It overpowered her, driving away everything else, even the comfort of Nick's hand on hers. She could see her as plainly as though she stood before her now. She had awakened in a blur of pain to see those eyes that were so like Rob's and yet so different, staring emotionlessly at her. Mrs. Simms's voice, clipped and forever haughty, cut through the lingering haze of the medication.

  "Well, Danielle, I trust that you are satisfied now that you have succeeded in depriving me of everything I treasured."

  Dani's bandaged hands fluttered helplessly and her numbed senses reacted to the cruelty of the words. She felt the weakness of moisture gathering in her eyes and slipping over her cheeks.

  "Tears, Danielle? You have no right to tears. You have no right to life. But I do have one consolation. You're more alone than I, and every day you live you'll remember that it's your fault. You have no one to blame but yourself."

  "No," Dani whimpered, and then felt Nick's hand squeezing hers.

  "What did you say?"

  She returned the pressure of his hand, needing his touch. She shaped her features into what she hoped resembled a smile before turning to him. "Nothing," she murmured.

  Chapter Eight

  Despite Nick's reassurances, Dani remained uneasy about the impending visit with his family. Nick's "place" on Lake Keystone didn't help her uneasiness either. She had expected an isolated rustic cabin at best, but when Nick turned off the highway at an unmarked road she needed no sign to tell her that they were entering Key Point, an exclusive residential community built on a peninsula jutting into the lake.

  The iron gates stood open, but Nick stopped to greet the uniformed security guard.

  The guard tipped his hat, expos
ing grizzled hair, and then spoke to Nick with a gravelly twang. "Sure is good to have you all back. Will you be staying long?"

  "Not this time, Jake," Nick told him. "You and Hat-tie will have the run of the place again after tomorrow."

  Nick drove slowly along the narrow, tree-lined road, past clusters of starkly modern cedar and glass condominiums that fit, oddly, with the boulder strewn and oak-covered hilltop. The road curved sinuously, now passing widely spaced, expensively rustic homes.

  Nick stopped the car to allow a covey of quail to scurry across the roadway to a meadow on the left Dani leaned back against the seat and exhaled tightly held breath. She breathed deeply, enjoying the dappled play of sunlight through the leaves. She could hear the lap of water against land, but the foliage toward the lake was so lush she caught only glimpses of silvered sunlight reflected from the water's surface.

  "It's beautiful here," she said and found herself smiling with genuine pleasure as the serenity of the discreetly gentled wilderness began soothing her taut nerves.

  "That's better," Nick told her as he caressed her cheek. His touch, and the warmth in his expression, completed the soothing process. After all, she realized, Nick wouldn't deliberately throw her into a situation where she would be uncomfortable.

  She caught his hand and held it to her cheek, placing a light kiss on it where it touched her lips.

  "Christians one, lions nothing?" he asked with a perception which caused her to look at him sharply before succumbing to an embarrassed laugh.

  "That's a little better score than was running through my mind earlier," she admitted. "But there aren't any games scheduled for today, are there?"

  "No," he said, moving his hand to trace the outline of her lips, "however, maybe later we can come up with an enjoyable alternative."

  She grinned at him then, half wishing they could skip the afternoon he had planned and proceed immediately with his enjoyable alternative.

  "You'd better stop that," she said a little breathlessly as she pulled away from his touch, "or by the time I meet your mother I won't even be able to remember my name."

  "Right," he said, not moving away. "Best behavior for Mother." And all of her uneasiness was back, hammering at the wall of her chest, trying to get out. "Hey," he murmured. "Don't look so stricken." He placed a light kiss on her mouth, pausing for one delicious moment to nibble at her lower lip. "Just be yourself. They're going to love you."

  Nick eased the car into gear, and Dani leaned back against the leather seat and watched his hands on the steering wheel as he guided the car over the now completely tree-lined road, wishing that she could be as relaxed and confident about this meeting as he appeared to be.

  When the road seemed to curve back upon itself, Nick turned to the right, onto a lane almost hidden by the roadside foliage. A small cabin sat nestled in the woods a short distance from the road. She looked at him questioningly.

  He shook his head. "Guest cottage," he said. "Hat-tie and Jake live in it now and look after the place." He nodded toward the right. "That road leads down to the garage and then on down to the boathouse."

  "Boathouse?" she asked. "And guest cottage? Nick, just what kind of place do you have out here?"

  "You're about to find out," he said, grinning. "We're here."

  The road ended in a graveled circle drive in front of a cedar-roofed red stone house protected by two towering blue spruce trees.

  It was really rather a modest house, considering its location. At least that was what she thought until Nick opened one of the double entry doors and she stepped into a terrazzo-tiled hallway.

  They stood in an area overlooking an enormous room. The hall stretched away on either side of them, but Dani's attention was drawn and held by the angular glass walls that rose at least twenty-five feet from floor to ceiling on the far side of the room over which she looked and which seemed to thrust out from the hill-side and hang poised over the lake itself.

  To the left she could see the massive white dam that had impounded the water and created this lake, and beyond that, in the distance, the skyline of Tulsa. To the right, no trace of civilization marred the tranquillity of water and wooded shore.

  She hesitated, entranced, until Nick took her by the arm and led her down the wide stairs. Downstairs she was able, for the first time, to draw her gaze from the spectacular view and see the room.

  Muted oriental rugs on the polished stone floor defined conversation areas furnished with the chintz and Chippendale Nick had once mentioned and accented by the chrome and glass he had talked of in the same sentence. It was a curious mixture of old and new, starkly modern with comfortably traditional, and yet the blending was so harmonious that no single element seemed to dominate, except, of course, the magnificent view.

  She was holding her breath again. She'd have to learn to stop that. Too many things about Nick had caused that reaction.

  "This is not exactly a vacation cottage," she said finally.

  "No. I meant it for my home."

  She heard the quiet pride in his voice and saw the softening of his expression as he glanced about the room.

  "But you don't live here." It was not a question.

  He turned his attention to her and studied her eyes.

  "No."

  "How can you bear to leave it?" she asked without thinking. If she had a home like this, nothing could keep her from living in it. No. That wasn't so, she realized. She closed her eyes against the sudden pain and then opened them quickly as the knowledge that she had made herself vulnerable to questions flooded through her.

  "What is it, Dani?" His voice, his eyes, his hand reaching to clasp her arm all demanded an answer.

  "Nothing," she said. It sounded brittle even to her. She gave a defiant toss of her head as though that would make her answer truthful. "Nothing." She smiled up at him. "Don't you think we'd better find your family?"

  She could tell that he wasn't satisfied with her answer, but he didn't press her for another. She saw the slight frown that crossed his face before he schooled his features into a smile. "That shouldn't be too difficult," he said as he glanced at his watch. "Mother and Janice are probably in the kitchen."

  "Are they on a schedule?" she asked.

  "A demanding one," he told her with exaggerated seriousness.

  He led the way down a long hall, past a dining room filled with graceful mahogany and paused at a swinging door as though listening. He nodded. "Just as I thought." He put his fingers to her lips, in a gesture warning her to be silent. He eased the door open and they slipped inside.

  Across the spacious kitchen two women sat in a blue-gingham-curtained breakfast area, engrossed in the flickering picture from a portable television. Nick stood quietly watching them, a gentle smile playing across his features.

  Nick's mother, for that was who she had to be, looked nothing like Dani had pictured. A tiny woman, with short gray hair cut in a casual style, she seemed completely relaxed as she leaned back in the Windsor chair, sipping coffee and dividing her attention between the television screen and the golden woman to her right.

  And Janice, for Dani knew that was who she must be, was golden—golden tan and golden hair—dressed in coral shorts and a matching tank top that emphasized the warm glow of her skin and the shapely length of her legs. She lounged unaffectedly in her chair, as equally engrossed in the televised story as the older woman.

  Nick waited until music from the set swelled to a crescendo and the announcer's voice began a commercial before speaking.

  "Is this all the welcome I'm going to get," he asked gruffly, "after driving out here to see you two?"

  "Nick!" His mother rose from her chair as she turned toward his voice. She hesitated when she saw Dani and then hurried toward her son, her progress slowed by a slight limp, but smiling broadly as she crossed the room. Nick met her halfway, lifting her off her feet and holding her against his chest in a great hug. Janice joined them and took her turn at being clasped against Nick's chest. He se
t her away from him and motioned to Dani.

  "Come over here." He laughed. "Mom, Janice, this is Dani."

  Dani, once again unsure of her welcome, smiled tentatively at the two women. Nick's mother seemed almost as unsure as she, she thought. The older woman's eyes held a question, but only for a moment, and then she smiled. "Hello, Dani."

  "Hello, Dani?" Janice interrupted, laughing. "Is that the best you can do?" A head taller than Dani, she seemed to envelop her when she draped her arm over Dani's shoulder. "Welcome to the zoo," she said cheerfully. "And if you can still tolerate that brother-in-law of mine after an afternoon of putting up with his family, you're better than he deserves."

  Janice's warmth was contagious. Dani felt herself being drawn to it. She could feel the affection flowing among the persons in the room. They were truly a family, she realized, separated by distance and divergent interests and yet united by some bond she had never known. Her throat tightened, and she felt a tiny flicker of anger—no, it couldn't be anger—for what she had missed.

  Playfully Nick pushed Janice aside and draped his own arm over Dani's shoulder, drawing her close to his side.

  "Speaking of family," he drawled, "where is the rest of it?"

  "Fishing," Nick's mother said.

  "And whatever you do," Janice added, "don't distract Tim too much. Otherwise, we'll have to have steak at our fish fry tonight."

  In the soft eruption of laughter, in the confusion of loving rejoinders that sparked from one to the other, Dani felt herself welcomed into the closely knit group. The feeling was alien to her, yet delightfully comforting, and she pushed back her last, lingering uncertainties and allowed herself to accept the affection that seemed so freely offered.

  Nick's mother hurried to get extra cups and soon they were all seated at the round, dark pine kitchen table as Nick regaled them with tales of the Brady Center dedication and the tribulations of drilling the Cow Chip Number One, which, if one believed his stories, must be resembling a Marx Brothers' film.