Imagine That

by Kristin Wallace

The absurdity of the stilted conversation brought a smile to his lips. She grinned back.

  Emily let her eyes drift from the top of his head to the tip of his shoes. “You clean up well, Mr. Cooper. I didn’t think you even owned a suit.”

  “I’ve got two. Mostly for church.” He glanced down with a rueful expression. “Or weddings now, I suppose. I can’t wait to get out of it. I feel like a trussed-up turkey.”

  “Some turkey,” she drawled.

  He chuckled and returned the slow perusal she’d subjected on him. “You look—” He paused to take a breath, “like a ray of sunshine.”

  Good grief. What was he saying? Was he trying to be a poet or something? What a laugh.

  “Would you like to dance?” he asked to cover up his unease.

  She hesitated. “Oh, umm…”

  Nate heard the pause. Would he never learn? He cleared his throat. “Never mind.”

  “No!” Emily reached out a hand. “To tell you the truth, I’d rather find a quiet corner and decompress.”

  He nodded. “Okay.”

  They managed to find a small table, which gave the impression of seclusion. Emily settled into the chair with a soft sigh. “Thank you, this is fine—”

  Her voice trailed off and something in her eyes shifted. A look of something almost like grief drifted across her face. Nate followed the direction of her gaze and spotted Julia and Seth walking among the guests. Seth had his arm around Julia’s waist. Of course, he hadn’t let his bride get more than three feet away all day.

  Nate turned back in time to catch Emily massaging her chest as if to ease a deep ache. When she noticed him watching, she dropped her hand

  “Are you okay?” he asked. “You look so sad all the sudden.”

  “Oh, I’m fine,” she said with a forced smile. “Weddings are tough, I suppose.”

  “I thought women loved them. All the pageantry and romance.”

  Emily’s head shook with enough force to make her curls vibrate. “Not me. I’d just as soon avoid them if I could. Actually, today is the first wedding I’ve been to since—” She bit her lip and the color leeched from her cheeks.

  For a moment, Nate thought she might pass out. He leaned forward and grabbed her hand. “Em…”

  She jerked.

  “Where’d you go?” he asked. “You’re white as a sheet.”

  She opened her mouth but could only manage a hoarse whisper. “I don’t feel well.”

  “Then let’s get out of here.”

  He helped her up, and Nate could see her hands were shaking. He feared she’d pass out and wondered if he’d have to catch her. What in the world had happened?

  “I haven’t spoken to Julia and Seth yet,” she said.

  “They won’t even know we were here.”

  Her head shook again. “I can’t just leave.”

  “All right, we’ll track them down, do our duty, and then we’ll go. Can you make it?”

  She pulled her shoulders back. “Of course.”

  They managed to catch up to the happy couple.

  Nate greeted Seth, while Emily went to Julia.

  “Nate, thank you for being here,” Seth said.

  “Wouldn’t have missed it. You’ve got yourself an amazing wife.”

  Seth grinned. “She’ll keep me on my toes for sure.”

  Nate studied Seth’s face. “You look happy. Peaceful.”

  “I am. It’s been a long road, but God’s proved faithful. As He will be for you and your family.”

  “I’d like to believe that.”

  “I was afraid you were having a tough time the other night,” Seth said, with a soft sigh. “When I get back we’ll talk. The two of us.”

  Nate shrugged. Talking wasn’t going to solve anything. He moved on to pay his respects to the bride and managed to catch some of the conversation between Emily and Julia.

  “Someday you’re going to have to tell me the story of your family,” Emily said.

  “When you have a few days,” Julia said. “You’ll have to play fair and tell me yours. Honestly, I wasn’t sure you’d come today. Not after the reaction you had at the bridal shop.”

  “Me?” Emily exclaimed. “Can’t think what you’re talking about. I love weddings.”

  Julia wagged a finger but didn’t comment as she switched her attention to him. “Nate, thank you for coming.”

  “I couldn’t miss your big day. I’m glad to see Seth so happy after everything he’s been through.”

  “What about what you’re going through?” she asked, her blue eyes reflecting sympathy and concern.

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “What if you could be more than fine?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Julia dipped her chin in Emily’s direction. “Be smart and something special could happen there.”

  Nate backed up. “Gotta go.”

  “Chicken.”

  “You know it.” He touched Emily’s arm. “You ready?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Nate paused. “Umm… do you need to speak to anyone else before we leave?”

  “No, why?”

  He cleared his throat. “Dr. Tweed.”

  “Who?”

  “Andrew Laughton. You were talking to him earlier. Seemed like you were having a good time.”

  Her eyes widened, and a short chuckle escaped her lips. “You call him Dr. Tweed?”

  “Never mind what I call him. Do you need to pay your respects to him, too?”

  “Don’t worry,” she said, eyes still shining with laughter. “I’ll catch up with him later. We’re just friends, after all. He’s fun and he makes me laugh.”

  Tension gripped his shoulder, even though he knew he shouldn’t care. So what if the guy made women giddy? So what if Emily lit up around him?

  “Laugh. Right. What do I make you do?” he asked, even though he knew the answer shouldn’t matter.

  Emily hesitated for a moment and then rose up on her toes. “You make me wish you hadn’t made a wait-until-marriage vow,” she whispered in his ear.

  Ask a stupid question. The words rushed through him like a charging bull. He opened his mouth, but no sound beyond a strangled groan emerged. “Let’s get out of here.”

  They ended up at the ice cream shop in town. Once armed with cold treats, they chose a table outside. Nate shook out of his coat and draped it over a chair. Then he loosened his tie and threw it on top of the table. Feeling as if he’d escaped from a straitjacket, he sat down with a sigh of relief and rolled up his sleeves.

  He glanced over at Emily in time to see her spoon a bite of ice cream into her mouth. She closed her eyes and made a sound no woman should utter outside of a bedroom. At least she shouldn’t. Not when the soft groan reminded him of truck beds and an enticing offer.

  He coughed and she glanced up. For a moment, they gazed into each other’s eyes.

  She held his stare as her tongue slipped out and licked her spoon.

  “Are you trying to kill me?” he asked. “Punish me for turning you down the other day?”

  “Maybe I want to you to regret not taking the chance to explore what we could have.”

  “Believe me, I don’t need your little show for me to wonder what it would have been like between us. My imagination works just fine.”

  A soft stain rose in her cheeks. “Sorry.”

  “I hope you know my choice is not about rejecting you personally.”

  “Rationally, I do. It’s refreshing in a weird way, I guess. Most men spend so much time trying to talk a woman into bed. You’re never sure if they care about you or if they just want a little action.”

  “Women can operate the same way. It’s a two-way street.”

  Her nose crinkled. “True.”

  The dessert and the conversation had accomplished one thing. “Your color is back,” he said.

  “Change of atmosphere,” she said.

  Speaking of atmosphere. “Did I hear Julia righ
t?” he asked. “Something about your reaction at the bridal shop? I thought you might be getting ready to do a header into the bushes back there.”

  A deep sigh rose from her chest, and she propped her chin on her hand. “I thought I could handle a wedding. It’s been long enough. I should be over it by now.”

  “Over what?”

  She studied him for a moment, as if trying to determine if she wanted to tell him. Finally, she took a deep breath.

  “Maybe my story would make sense if you understood I went through a rebellious period where men are concerned. For most of my life I tried to please my parents. I wrote the kind of things they approved of, even though the people in my mind had three heads and wings instead of arms. I dated appropriate guys, even though they bored me to tears. Then in college, I entered a writing contest, and I won. The prize wasn’t big, but I was so proud. My parents couldn’t have cared less. So, I stopped trying.”

  “Boy, do I know about that.”

  “I imagine so.” Her sad expression eased as she acknowledged his point. “My rebellion also included men. I dated a string of losers. Guys I knew my parents would hate.”

  “One of them hurt you? Someone turned you off love and weddings?”

  “Oh, I didn’t care enough about any of them to get hurt,” she said. “Eventually, I grew tired of the game. Didn’t date anyone for more than a year. I holed myself up in my apartment and let myself write the book I needed to write, which became Kingdom of Dreams. To my utter amazement, the book sold and before I knew it—”

  “You’d become famous.”

  Emily twirled the spoon in the air. “Bingo. I toured all over the country, speaking on college campuses, which is where I met Colin. He taught history at Boston College. He was smart, successful, charming, and handsome.”

  “You fell in love.”

  “I sure thought so,” she said, shifting the ice cream around in the bowl. “Colin was everything my parents could have envisioned for me. I have to admit, part of the attraction was the hope that he might help accomplish what I’d never been able to do on my own.”

  “What?”

  “Gain my parents’ approval.”

  “Did he?”

  She laughed, but the sound carried a dark note of bitterness. “Oh, yeah, just not in the way I imagined. I brought him home for Thanksgiving. My whole family was together for once. My brother and his wife, and my sister, Charlotte.”

  The way Emily said her sister’s name caused an alarm to go off, and he tensed. “What happened?”

  The ice cream had become soup by now, but she kept swishing the sloppy mess around her bowl anyway. “The dinner seemed to go well. Colin could talk about anything. He’d done some writing himself, though it was academic rather than fiction, but he was good. He could even keep up with Charlotte. Few men ever managed to do that.”

  “She’s the genius, right? The one who wrote a philosophy book at age ten?”

  “Not quite, but yes, she’s a certified genius.” Emily smiled but didn’t let up on turning her dessert into mush. “Anyway, I could tell she liked Colin, which was a miracle. Charlotte is an extreme feminist. She always claimed she’d never subject herself to the domination of a man, and that marriage was nothing more than a legal form of slavery.”

  Nate already didn’t like the wondrous Charlotte. “Harsh.”

  “She could be harsh and cold, but during dinner the most amazing thing happened. Colin made her blush, and then she—” Emily paused and jammed the spoon hard into the bowl.

  He grabbed the spoon. “She what?”

  Robbed of her security blanket, Emily took to running her fingers along the table top. “She giggled.”

  “So?”

  “My sister does not giggle,” she said, fingers curling around the edges of the table. “She might allow herself a condescending smile, but never a genuine laugh. And she’d never blushed in her life. When she did, something shifted in the room. I’m not even sure they realized it. I don’t think I completely did until later.”

  “They?”

  “Colin and Charlotte. I’ve heard of love at first sight, but I didn’t believe it actually happened outside of romance novels.”

  “Maybe you were seeing something that wasn’t there.”

  By now, Emily was gripping the table with enough force to pull it apart. Catching herself, she laced her hands together and dropped them to her lap. She wouldn’t look him in the eye, but instead stared out at the street.

  “I wish,” she said. “I made all the arguments. It was my imagination. I was nervous about being with the family. And Charlotte? She doesn’t do love. I was so wrong and so right.”

  “How were you wrong?”

  Emily finally regarded him. “We were all about to leave. I went to the kitchen for some water and when I came back I happened to catch a glimpse of Colin and Charlotte in the mirror. He was helping her put her coat on and then he straightened the collar.”

  “Her collar.”

  “I know it sounds silly, but if you had seen his expression, you’d understand,” she said. “When they looked at each other, it was like they were both discovering something wonderful and precious. Colin had never looked at me like I was precious.”

  Nate realized he’d been gripping his own spoon tight enough to cut off his circulation. He dropped the utensil. “They had an affair?”

  “Nothing so sordid. I actually made it easy for them. On the drive home I asked Colin what he’d thought of my family.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Oh, he loved everyone. He mentioned how much he’d liked talking books with my parents and debating the merits of Hemingway versus the great European writers. How my brother’s wife was so charming and sweet. In fact, he mentioned everyone except Charlotte. So I did. I came right out and said, “Charlotte is pretty special, isn’t she?”

  Nate had the feeling he’d fallen into a real-life soap opera. “What happened?” he asked, though he had a feeling he already knew.

  “He didn’t say anything right away, but I could see his jaw tighten. So I asked again, and finally he answered yes. It was all I needed. I knew our relationship was over. It had been the moment we sat down at the dining room table. I stayed at a hotel that night.”

  Nate’s heart ached for her. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for the man she loved to fall for her sister. “Did you ever see him again?”

  “Of course. He and Charlotte married.”

  Nate reared back as if he’d been shot. “What?”

  “Seems crazy, right?”

  “Not crazy. I can’t believe your sister would be so cruel.”

  “Why shouldn’t she be happy with Colin? After all, it wasn’t like he’d ever loved me. He couldn’t have, if he’d fallen for Charlotte so quickly. I’d get over it.”

  Emily had made the whole statement without a trace of emotion in her voice, but her expression reflected utter devastation.

  “Why does that sound like someone’s quote?” Nate asked.

  “You’re good at recognizing my mother’s helpful advice.” Emily’s lips tilted up in a ghost of a smile, but her eyes remained dead. “She called me the next day. She’d seen the same thing I had. Probably realized the truth the moment Colin and Charlotte first passed the butter. My mother said there was no use standing in the way when anyone could see Colin and I weren’t right for each other. I could be selfish and hinder their destiny, or I could act like an adult for once and do the right thing for everyone.”

  “Which was to give the Professor and Charlotte your complete blessing?”

  “Pretty much.”

  He wanted to throw the iron chair across the street. “And no one cared how you felt?”

  “Oh, Charlotte did. Colin felt bad, too. They hadn’t planned on falling in love. I did ask them to at least wait a few months, but it ended up only being a couple weeks. He took Charlotte to the department holiday party.”

  “So, you were expected to be h
appy for them and pretend nothing was wrong? I have to ask, but what kind of family did you come from? I’d rather tear off my right arm than take a girl my brother loved. And your mother expecting you to be fine with it is completely warped.”

  Emily shrugged. “My mother expects a lot of things from me. I usually fall well short of those expectations.”

  “What did you do? Just go on like life was normal?”

  “I tried. I started my second book. At first I was grateful to have my writing because it allowed me to ignore all the wedding preparations going on. Then I realized something was wrong. I struggled so hard with the book. The hardest time I’ve ever had. I’d gotten stuck before, but I’d always managed to write myself out of the hole. With Sword of the Dark I kept hitting roadblocks, and I couldn’t find my way around them.”

  Nate snorted. “Well, no wonder. You were nursing a broken heart. Your boyfriend and your sister had betrayed you, and your entire family sanctioned the thing as if it was a blessed union. I bet they made you stand up in the wedding as a bridesmaid.”

  “She didn’t have bridesmaids or anything. A simple ceremony in front of a justice of the peace.”

  “Which I’m sure you were expected to attend.”

  “How could I not go? I had to prove everything was fine. Except it was anything but fine. My heart had been smashed, and then my career started going off the rails. Sword of the Dark received a lot of bad reviews.”

  “Why didn’t people like it?”

  “People didn’t connect with my heroine. They said she was unlikable. She didn’t act like a heroine, but a victim.”

  “You wrote a heroine who wouldn’t fight back,” Nate said.

  A bitter laugh emerged. “Yeah, talk about projecting.”

  “I can understand why your personal drama drifted into your fantasy life. Did you connect the two things?”

  “Not for a long time. I guess I didn’t want to see the truth, but then everything caved in again.” She ran a shaky hand through her hair, biting her lip as tears began coasting down her cheek. “About seven months ago, Charlotte told me she was pregnant.”

  Yet another blow to knock her down. “Is that when the characters in your head went away?”

  She took a shuddering breath and nodded. “Mm-hmm.”

  “So your travels have been more about escaping the pain of their betrayal than looking for a way to restart your imagination.”