by Mary McBride
He turned down Grant, picked up his pace, and twenty minutes later was threading his way through a selection of minivans on the crowded tarmac of Howard "It's A Deal" Deal's used-car lot.
After a few bleak minutes of sticker shock and deep mourning for the Corvette, Sonny spotted just the vehicle he had in mind. A big blue box with a luggage rack on top and fake wood panels on the sides. A van that practically screamed "For the Family Man." By the time a salesman had hotfooted it out from the office, Sonny already had his checkbook in his hand.
* * *
Melanie stood in the nursery, a paintbrush in her right hand and the phone in her left. She was talking to Sam Venneman, or more precisely, she was talking to herself, having been put on hold for the third time while the mayor chatted up somebody else.
It had occurred to her earlier that, instead of spending all her time on an emotional roller coaster and peeking out windows like a crazy woman, she might just as well go back to work for the next few weeks. Not only would that preserve her sanity, but it would also guarantee a Sonny-free environment for eight or ten hours a day. That was why she had called Sam at city hall, but he'd put her on hold so often that she hadn't yet had a chance to mention coming back.
"Still there, Melanie?" Sam asked tentatively, as if he weren't sure he had pushed the right button.
"I'm here," she answered. "Sam, I was—"
"Wait just a minute, Melanie."
Even with his hand covering the mouthpiece, she could hear a female voice in his vicinity while Sam murmured a string of okays and uh-huhs. Waiting for him to resume their conversation, she began picturing his calendar. Wasn't he supposed to be making a speech at a Rotary luncheon today? She glanced at her watch. He'd have to hurry to get there in time. Cleo Pierce wasn't doing her job if she didn't prod Sam away from his desk in a reasonable time to—
"Back again," he said cheerfully.
"Don't you have a Rotary luncheon today, Sam?"
"Do I?" He sounded surprised. "Wait. I'll ask Cleo." Then he covered the phone again for a moment. "Cleo said it was postponed until next week, Melanie."
"Oh. Well, if Cleo just came into talk to you, maybe I should call back some other time."
"No. No. She didn't just come in. She's working temporarily at the coffee table here in my office because they're painting hers."
"Oh." Melanie frowned. The least he could have said was yours. "What color?"
"I have no idea," he said. "Wait. I'll ask her." There was more murmuring, and even some soft chuckling, before Sam said, "It's teal, Cleo says. More green than blue. What? Oh, more of a peacock green. She says she thinks you'll love it. Melanie? Still there?"
"I'm here," she said, trying to maintain a neutral tone similar to the one on the walls in her former office. Peacock green? She had a headache just contemplating it.
"Good," Sam said. "Sorry it's been so hectic here. I meant to tell you it was great seeing you and Sonny at the party Saturday. Did you watch the coverage on the eleven o'clock news?"
"No." Melanie rolled her eyes. "I missed it."
"Too bad. Thanks to Sonny, we scored a few nice points for the Cop on the Block program. Now what was it that you wanted to discuss with me?"
At this point Melanie had almost forgotten why she'd called him in the first place.
"Well, Sam, I was thinking…"
Her voice drifted off as her gaze strayed to the window. A blue minivan had just turned into Sonny's driveway.
"I was just wondering…"
The van pulled all the way to the back of the driveway as if intending to park there permanently.
"It occurred to me…"
The last person in the world she ever expected to see climb out from behind the wheel of a stodgy minivan was Sonny Randle, but there he was in all his long-legged glory. He stood there a moment, as if admiring the hulking vehicle, then slid open its side door, reached in, and pulled out a large brown grocery sack with a loaf of French bread sticking out the top.
"Melanie, you don't sound like yourself," Sam said on the other end of the line. "What's going on? Are you all right?"
"Well, Sam…"
A minivan? Sonny traded his Corvette for a minivan? He was now striding toward her house with an armload of groceries.
"I should probably go, Sam," she said. "Sorry I bothered you. I'll call back later when you have more time."
He was spluttering something very un-Samlike when she broke the connection.
A minivan? Groceries?
Melanie raced down the staircase and reached the front door at the same moment the bell chimed. Before she opened the door, she swallowed hard to clear her heart from her throat.
"Hey, babe." A grin blazed across Sonny's face. "I don't have a refrigerator yet so I was hoping I could stash some of this in yours."
She felt her mouth opening and closing without issuing any sounds. She probably looked like a goldfish that had just flopped out of its bowl, she thought.
Sonny cocked his head. "Is that a yes?"
"Oh, I guess so. Why not?" She stepped back to let him enter. The golden crust of the French bread passed inches from her nose, and her stomach growled in response.
"Hungry?" he asked over his shoulder as he started toward the kitchen.
Following behind him, she clasped her arms over her stomach to stifle the ridiculously loud noises. "No."
Sonny proceeded to empty the contents of the grocery bag on the kitchen table. First came the beautiful bread. Then lush red tomatoes. Carrots with long, leafy tops. A polished eggplant. A big, papery head of garlic. A box of imported pasta. A wedge of Parmesan. One surprise after another appeared from the depths of the sack until Melanie couldn't keep silent anymore.
"Who are you?" she exclaimed.
"What?"
"Who are you?" she repeated, gesturing toward the gourmet delights on the table. "Where's the Wonder bread? Where are the SpaghettiOs cans? The pretzels? Where's the six-pack of bargain beer?"
"I got this instead." He winked as he pulled a bottle of wine from the bag and perused its label. "Château Margaux '95. Think it's any good?"
"Good!" Melanie nearly choked. She didn't know all that much about wine, but instantly recognized the vintage that His Honor, the snob, had insisted they serve at his last inauguration dinner. The Bordeaux must've cost Sonny at least thirty dollars, she guessed. Maybe more. "It's better than good," she said. "Way too good to swill with your pals while you're tearing out linoleum."
"I thought we could have it for dinner."
"Dinner? When?"
"Tonight."
"I've already made plans." That those plans included frozen macaroni and cheese plus a can of warmed-up green beans wasn't something she felt obliged to disclose. "Go ahead and put whatever you want in the fridge. Here. I'll make room in the vegetable bin."
When Melanie opened the refrigerator door, the outpouring of cool air felt good on her face and neck. She didn't remember always feeling feverish when she and Sonny had lived together. Maybe she was actually coming down with something. It wouldn't have surprised her a bit, considering her level of stress and woeful lack of sleep these past few days.
She squatted, jerked open one of the drawers at the bottom of the appliance, then pushed aside a bag of carrots and some loose stalks of pale, limp celery. Stretching back her arm, she said, "There's plenty of room. Give me the carrots and the eggplant."
But instead of placing a vegetable in her open hand, Sonny grasped it with his own.
"Let's have dinner, Mel. Come on. You have to eat, right?"
Yes, dammit, she had to eat, but she wasn't sure she could even swallow the way her heart kept creeping up into her throat, not to mention her Sonny-induced fever. Now, all of a sudden, tears blurred her eyes, and she did her best to blink them away.
"Why are you doing this to me, Sonny?" The frustration she couldn't suppress any longer trembled in her voice.
"Hell, baby. I love you."
"Well, stop
."
"I can't," he said softly as he knelt beside her in front of the open refrigerator. There was a rough, wet catch in his voice when he added, "I can't stop loving you, Mel."
"Oh, Sonny." She sighed and stared straight ahead at the blurred picture of the missing child on the milk carton because she couldn't bear to look at her ex-husband. If there were tears in his beautiful eyes to match the sad sound of his voice, she wouldn't be able to restrain her own tears and she'd wind up in a soggy, salty heap right here on the floor.
"Let's start over, sweetheart." He slipped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against him. "We could do that. Let's pretend we just met. We'll take it nice and slow and…"
"We didn't take it nice and slow when we met, Sonny," she said, knuckling a tear from her eye. "We didn't know how to do anything but hot and fast, and look where that got us."
He gave a mournful little laugh. "You're right. But it'll be different this time. I'm different."
"Maybe," she said with uncertainty. "People just don't change like that, though. God knows, I haven't changed."
"I don't want you to change, Mel. I want you just the way you are."
"Oh, please," she moaned, then leaned back far enough to close the refrigerator door with its burden of magnets, each of them holding up some sort of list. She gestured toward them. "Are you saying you really liked being married to Little Miss List Maker, the Queen of the Post-It notes?"
"I liked being married to you, babe. Not that I was around often enough to show it."
"You love your job, Sonny."
"Not as much as I love you. I guess it took that bullet a couple weeks ago to get me to really see that." He sighed, tipping his head against hers. "It scared the hell out of me, Mel. I honestly thought I'd been hit. I thought it was all over. I lay there on the pavement, thinking I was dying, maybe even already dead, and the only thing I regretted, the only thing, was not getting it right with you."
"Sonny, it wasn't all your fault. I…"
"I want to do it right this time, Mel." His voice snagged again. "Please."
They sat there for the next few minutes without speaking. Above the low and continual hum of the refrigerator, Melanie could hear Sonny's deep and even breathing. His arm circled her shoulders, imparting his warmth, tempting her to lean against him just a little more while she considered all the reasons she ought to say no.
They were just too different. Day and night. Black and white. Sonny was a willy-nilly roller coaster and she was a flat, straight, well-marked road. Oil and water. Rain and shine. His weather was wild and unpredictable while hers was calm and carried the Farmers' Almanac stamp of approval. Dog and cat. High and low. The King of Chaos meets the Queen of Caution.
She had a million reasons to tell him no, not the least of which was that she simply couldn't endure the pain of another failure.
And yet, in spite of all those reasons, Melanie couldn't bring herself to say that simple word—no—because she had the feeling that if she said it, Sonny would never ask again. It would be more final than their divorce. She simply couldn't bear that.
"I… It's just that I had everything all planned out," she said, shaking her head, sounding so pitiful she could barely stand her own voice.
"I know."
"This house," she went on. "The nursery. The baby. The way Christmas will be a year and a half from now. Everything. But now it's all up in the air again."
"I know." His hand smoothed up and down her arm. "Don't answer right now, okay? Just tell me you'll think about it."
She lifted her hands helplessly, then let them drop back in her lap. As if she could think about anything else. As if she could think at all when Sonny was so close beside her.
"All right," she said. "I'll think about it."
"Good." Sonny sounded as relieved as she felt to have the situation temporarily solved. He stood up, and in one smooth motion lifted Melanie to her feet. "Now that we've got that settled, let's stash these groceries and go for a ride in my new van."
* * *
Chapter 10
« ^ »
The minivan handled like a Cracker Jack box mounted on four sticky licorice tires. It went from zero to sixty in about a month and cornered with all the precision of a rusty tricycle. Sonny hated it. But that was okay. He hadn't bought it to please himself. Melanie loved it, which was the whole point. As they wove through side streets to avoid the late-afternoon traffic, she kept smiling and looking back at the built-in child seat.
Sonny wasn't driving quite as aimlessly as it seemed. Mel wasn't the only one with plans, and right now his was to nail down this family-man image by stopping by the Kaczinskis' for a dose of unadulterated suburban bliss.
"This is Mike and Connie's street, isn't it?" she asked, squinting and pulling down the visor on her side to escape the bright late-afternoon sunshine.
"Yeah, it is. I thought we'd stop for a minute so I could give Mike a peek at my new wheels."
Even though his gaze held primarily on the street, he could tell Melanie was staring at him. She had shifted slightly sideways in the passenger seat. Her arms were crossed and her head cocked at a curious angle. Sometimes, because she was so predictable, he had an innate feel for what she was thinking. This wasn't one of those times, though.
"What?" he asked with another quick glance in her direction. She was wearing one of her most inscrutable smiles.
"I was just wondering," she said, "when you were going to 'fess up about missing the Corvette."
"I don't miss it," he lied, pretending to be shocked at the very notion.
"You loved that car, Sonny."
"Loved. Past tense, Mel."
"You had it for years. How many? Six or seven?"
"So?"
"Well, I just find it hard to believe that you don't miss it. That car was so … so you."
"Was." He reached out to pat the dashboard. "This is me now. Solid. Steady."
"Square," she added with a laugh.
His mouth tightened and, for just a second, he was wounded by the description, until he reminded himself that square was good and precisely what he wanted to be. No more Joe Cool. He was Fred Family now. Harry Homeowner. Vincent Van.
But that new image suffered another blow when he turned the minivan into the Kaczinskis' driveway and Connie came out of the front door trying to keep her eyeballs from bulging out of their sockets.
"I don't believe this," she exclaimed.
"See," Melanie said. "I rest my case."
* * *
Melanie had always liked Connie Kaczinski. The shapely blonde had been a photographer for Associated News, and had even been nominated for a Pulitzer prize, but had given it up when she'd given birth to Michael, Jr. six years ago. Now she took amazing photographs of birthday parties and backyard barbecues instead of three-alarm fires and scenes of brutal crimes.
The two women rarely spent any time alone. But now, while Sonny and Mike stood in the driveway nodding and rubbing their jaws as they did slow circles around the van, Melanie sat with Connie in the screened porch on the side of their house.
Connie had just moved the white wicker furniture out there today to take advantage of the warm spring temperatures. Six-year-old Michael was plopped on a floor cushion watching cartoons on a little TV, and Baby Jacob, taking a little breather from toddling, had kerplunked on the floor between the two women and was sorting plastic blocks by some secret system only he was privy to. Melanie could hardly take her eyes off the busy little guy.
"He really sold the Corvette, huh?" Connie said, tightening the blond ponytail at the nape of her neck and leaning back as if she'd had a long day. "I probably shouldn't tell you this, but I bet Mike twenty dollars that Sonny wouldn't be able to do it."
"That's okay. I would have bet twenty thousand dollars," Melanie said, stretching forward to pick up an errant yellow block for Jacob. "In fact, deep in my heart I still believe he's just got it stowed away in a garage somewhere close by so he can visit it every
few days. Here you go, Jakey."
A pudgy hand grabbed the proffered block.
"What do you say, Jakey?" Connie said.
"Tanks," be said.
"You're welcome, kiddo. Wow. I can't believe he's walking and talking already, Connie," Melanie said. "I guess it's been almost a year since I last saw him."
The blonde frowned slightly in response, reminding Melanie that the Kaczinskis had been Sonny's friends for a long time before she was even a blip on his radar.
"Sonny looks happier than he has in a long time," Connie said. "It's none of our business, Melanie, but Mike loves Sonny like a brother. You know?" She turned her head to look at them out in the driveway. "Oh, jeez. Now they're looking under the hood like there's a pot of gold hidden in there."
Melanie turned to look. She probably shouldn't have. Sonny was reaching to fiddle with something near the engine, and the sight of her ex-husband's long, strong legs and the clearly defined muscles rippling across the back of his shirt made her mouth go a little dry. She could hear herself swallow, and wondered if Connie could hear it, too.
"Mike said Sonny went absolutely nuts when he found out you were planning to have a kid," Connie said. "He put his fist through a door or a wall or something at the precinct."
"That's not too hard to imagine." She sighed and gazed down at little Jacob, who was licking a red block as if it were a Popsicle. "Does that taste good?" she asked him.
He held the wet block out to her. "Some?"
"No, thank you, Jakey."
"For what it's worth, Melanie, Mike thinks that taking that bullet really changed Sonny. I wasn't quite so convinced. I said I'd reserve judgment until he got rid of the Corvette." She laughed. "I wonder if Mike would consider taking that twenty bucks in trade."
As she was speaking, the two minivan inspectors appeared in the doorway to the porch.
"You owe me twenty bucks," Mike said, winking at his wife.