by Sandra Brown
"Tonight's the night of the carnival, Mom," Matt reminded her through a mouthful of empty calories and pastel, teeth-rotting goo.
"That's right."
She tried to interject enthusiasm into her voice. All week, she'd avoided thinking about this Saturday night, as if thinking about it would attach some special significance to it.
She hadn't seen Thad since he'd walked her to her back door Monday evening. The children had given her daily progress reports on Penny's puppies, but she hadn't solicited any information about Thad. It was almost a relief that the dreaded day had finally arrived. By this time tomorrow, it would be over and done with.
"Don't be late getting home. Thad said he'd be here a few minutes before seven to pick us up," Megan told her.
"I promise not to be late," Elizabeth said a little too sharply. She modified her tone and said, "I'll get here in plenty of time to change. Just be sure that all your chores are done. I'm leaving a list for Mrs. Alder."
Ordinarily on Saturdays the hours she spent in Fantasy crawled by. She was guiltily aware that her children were out of school and spending a great part of their weekend at home without her. But this Saturday, the time flew. She couldn't retard the hours' rapid march no matter how many menial tasks she masochistically assigned herself. Five o'clock arrived. She locked up and drove home.
The children were so excited they nearly tackled her when she came through the door. "Thad called and said he'd be here at six forty-five. Hurry, Mom."
"Megan, that's an hour and a half away. I'll be ready. I promise."
But of course she wasn't.
Baby threw up something that looked like pimento cheese on the living-room sofa. It had to be cleaned up immediately. Matt and Megan got in a scuffle over the remote control of the TV. That resulted in Matt banging his head on the corner of the coffee table hard enough to break the skin. He bled on his hair and the carpet. Both had to be washed.
Elizabeth broke a nail on her bureau drawer. When she tried to repair it, she super-glued two fingers together. By the time she got around to eye makeup, she was so rushed and nervous she couldn't get it right. She couldn't decide what to wear. So she was standing in her bare feet and underwear when Matt came into her bedroom at six forty-three to see if she was ready.
"Aw, Mom!" he wailed when he saw that she wasn't.
She was as incredulous over his appearance as he was over hers. He was wearing clothing fit only for a ragpicker. "Matthew, those jeans have holes in the knees. Go put on your new ones.
"They're all stiff and scratchy."
"They are not. I washed and dried them twice." Standing at her closet door, she wondered if she should wear her blue chambray skirt or the black slacks fresh from the cleaners?
"I want to wear these jeans. They're cool."
The blue chambray skirt. "Your new ones, please, sir. And that sweatshirt is big enough for me. Go change right now. Put on your green polo shirt."
"It's dorky."
"You're not going out in public—"
The doorbell pealed. "He's here!" Matt screeched.
"Come back here!" Elizabeth called. But she could already hear her son clumping down the stairs trying to beat his sister to the front door.
"I'll get it!"
* * *
Elizabeth never knew which one made it to the door first. The next voice she heard was Thad's. "Hi. I see you're ready and raring to go."
"We are," Megan told him.
"But Mom's not," Matt was overheard to say. "She's always late 'cause she lies in the bathtub till all the bubbles are gone. She's putting on her clothes. Sometimes that takes a long time too."
"Well, we're not in that big a hurry, are we? Why don't we wait for her in the living room?"
Upstairs, Elizabeth happened to catch a glimpse of herself in the cheval glass that stood in the corner of her bedroom. She had an ear pressed to her door so as not to miss a single word and had her long skirt clutched to her chest.
Impatient with herself for looking and acting ridiculous, even to herself, she stepped into the skirt and pulled a soft white wool sweater over her head. She gathered her hair back into a ponytail, quickly misted herself with fragrance, and left the room.
She didn't want Thad Randolph to think she was primping for him like a coed keeping her prom date waiting. She took the stairs with an aggressive tread, but paused before entering the living room. He was standing with his back to her, listening while Matt explained the intricacies of a Legos battleship he was building.
"Hello."
At the sound of her voice, he came around on the heels of his boots. Dressed in jeans, a plain cotton sports shirt, and a gray suede bomber jacket that did terrific things for his hair and eyes, he made an impressive escort. Slightly better than impressive. He made her palms sweat.
"Hi. Matt said you were still getting dressed." His eyes swept down her body, all the way to the toes of her ivory leather boots with the slouch cuff, then back up again. "I hope we didn't rush you."
"No. Are we ready?" He nodded. The children exuberantly chorused their readiness.
Matt delayed them by putting up an argument against taking a jacket. Elizabeth insisted on it, since many of the festival's activities were outdoors. And a jacket would camouflage his choice of wardrobe.
"The sooner you get your jacket, the sooner we can leave," Thad remarked.
Matt made it upstairs to his room and back in record time. Thad escorted them out. He was flanked by Matt and Megan. Elizabeth brought up the rear after locking the door behind them. It felt strange to be riding in the front seat of Thad's Jeep wagon with him behind the wheel and the children in the back seat. To anyone observing them, they would look like the all-American family on an outing. The thought made her jittery.
So much so that she actually jumped when Thad said, "You look pretty tonight."
He had wedged the unexpected compliment in sideways between her children's nonstop chatter. "Thank you. So do you. Look nice, I mean.
"Thanks."
They smiled across the front seat at each other. Elizabeth's insides quivered slightly beneath his appreciative blue gaze. She was actually grateful to Matt when he demanded Thad's attention.
The school building was almost rocking with the activity going on inside it. The campus was swarming with hyper children and their parents, who tried in vain to keep up with them as they raced from one gaily decorated booth to another, plying their skills at the various games.
The first order of business was to purchase tickets that were redeemable at all the booths and concession stands. Elizabeth knew the PTA officer who was selling them and had no choice but to introduce her to Thad. So avid was the other woman's curiosity that she miscounted his change twice before giving him the correct amount.
"You should have let me buy the tickets," Elizabeth told him as they moved away from the ticket booth. She was aware of every curious glance and whispering tongue.
"Consider it my contribution to the local PTA," he replied, unperturbed. "Where to first, kids?"
Elizabeth's fears that he would have an awful time were unfounded. To her surprise Thad got into the spirit of the festival. He offered Megan advice at the Fishin' Hole and she ended up winning a bottle of liquid bubbles. At the basketball goal, he held Matt up so he'd have a better chance at scoring. Matt came away from that with a bag of marbles in his hand and a grin on his face that made Elizabeth's heart ache. She saw the smug glances her son cast his friends as he walked away with Thad. He didn't have a father to brag to the other boys about and was taking full advantage of Thad's prowess.
They stopped at several other booths before Elizabeth asked, "Is anybody hungry? It's either spaghetti or hot dogs," she informed their guest apologetically.
"Great. I'm starved."
They decided on hot dogs. Matt and Megan ate theirs in about three bites. "Can we get our faces painted, Mom?" Megan asked after slurping up the last of her soft drink.
Matt was hopping up an
d down beside his chair. "Yeah, I want to get the devil face."
"How appropriate." Elizabeth laughed, pinching him on his mustard-smeared cheek.
"Can we, Mom? It only costs six tickets."
"Thad and I haven't eaten yet."
"That'll take forever." Megan moaned. "Then you'll want to drink coffee for an hour."
"Would it be all right if they went alone?" Thad asked her.
"Can we, Mom? Can we?"
"May we," she corrected. "Yes, you may if you promise to come right back here. If you get lost in this crowd, we'll never find you. And stay together," she called after them.
Clutching the tickets Thad had doled out to them, they squirmed their way through the cafeteria crowd and out into the jammed corridor toward the face-painting booth.
"Oh, to have that much energy," Thad said, taking the first bite out of his hot dog.
Elizabeth shook her head remorsefully. "I tried to warn you. You'll be exhausted by the time you get home tonight."
"I'm having a great time."
The wonder of it was that he truly seemed to be enjoying himself. He was as interested in the school as the PTA mothers were in Elizabeth Burke's "date." As though reading her mind, he said, "I'm an oddity, aren't I? Or am I getting paranoid? Is everyone staring at me, or is that my imagination?"
She smiled and ducked her head shyly. "They're staring. Everybody knows I'm single."
"How long have you been single? When was your husband killed?" She glanced up at him in surprise. "One of the neighbors told me when I moved in," he replied to her unspoken question. "I didn't ask. The information was volunteered."
Because he seemed so sincere, she didn't find it awkward to share with him the facts surrounding her husband's death. "John was killed two years ago. Automobile accident. He was pronounced dead at the scene."
"Were you and the children with him?"
"No."
"Thank God."
"It happened on his way to work. Two policemen came to the house that morning and asked me to go to the hospital with them." She returned her half-eaten hot dog to the paper plate. "I was changing the shelf paper in the kitchen cabinets. I'll never forget that. When I got home that afternoon, all the dishes were still stacked on the table and the cupboard doors were standing open. For a minute, I couldn't remember why."
"A sudden death like that, it must have been rough on you."
"It was like having the world pulled out from under me." Willfully shaking off her reflective mood, she looked at him. "Have you ever lost anyone close to you?"
"No. Not that way," he said shortly. "Would you like some coffee?"
"Please."
He left the table and headed for the booth where beverages were being dispensed. Elizabeth watched as he made halting progress through the crowd. He had lost someone, but not by death. Who? How? Had he been rejected by someone he loved?
Heads turned; eyes followed him. He captured the attention of nearly every woman his shadow fell on. What woman wouldn't be attracted? Physically, he had a rugged, hard-hat appeal. But his personality was incongruous with his physique. He was sensitive and soft-spoken. He wasn't out to prove how macho he was. His masculinity spoke for itself.
She had never seen a woman at his house, but it was obvious that he didn't live like a monk. He had perfected a method of being sexy and courteous at the same time. He knew how to treat a woman like a lady. And he knew how to treat a lady like a woman.
He wasn't an octopus with groping hands, but he didn't shy away from taking her elbow and guiding her through a crowd. Several times she'd felt his hand at the small of her back, giving her a gentle nudge forward. These mannerly touches had never failed to elicit a thrill.
No, around a woman, he wasn't awkward at all. Why, then, was he single? Had he had a disastrous marriage and messy divorce that turned him off marriage forever? Did monthly alimony payments make a second marriage economically unfeasible? Or did he simply enjoy the sexual freedom of a bachelor's life? Why hadn't she seen any women around his house?
He set the Styrofoam cup of coffee in front of her. "Cream or sugar?"
"Sugar." He passed her a packet of sugar, which he'd had the foresight to bring back to the table with him. She absently opened the packet and stirred the sugar into her cup with a plastic spoon. "Have you ever been married, Thad?"
"No." He sipped his coffee, staring at her through the rising steam.
"Oh." She had hoped for some elaboration, but apparently his private life was just that.
"I'm straight, if that's what you're wondering."
She burned her tongue on her coffee. Embarrassment stained her throat and face with vivid color. "I wasn't."
"Sure you were."
She couldn't quite meet that teasing gaze. "Maybe I was. Subconsciously."
"No offense taken. Unfortunately, if I had set out to prove to you that I am heterosexual, you would have been offended." Mischief turned his eyes an even deeper shade of blue. "Although I'd be more than happy to accommodate you if you want proof."
Her previous blush was mild compared to the one that suffused her now. "I believe you." She cleared her throat. "It's just that by the time a man gets to be your age, he's usually been married at least once."
"By the time a man gets to be my age, he's done just about everything at least once," he said, teasing her again. He smiled with her, then lowered his head and stared into his coffee. "I've had several opportunities to get married. There have been a few serious involvements that could have eventually led to marriage, I suppose, but none of them worked out before one or both of us lost interest." Lifting his head, he asked, "Why haven't you remarried?"
Her mind had latched on to his "serious involvements," so it was a moment before she assimilated his question. "I was very much in love with John. We had a good marriage. For a long time after he died, I was in an emotional vacuum. Then I got busy with Fantasy. You know what it takes for anybody to run a business single-handed. The problems are quadrupled if you're a widow with children. I had to be both parents to them. All that combined didn't leave much time and energy for a personal life. And," she said, drawing a deep breath, "I haven't fallen in love with anyone else."
"I guess that's the bottom line, isn't it?"
"Are you saying you've never been in love?"
"In lust, maybe. I've met a lot of women I liked sleeping with, but damned few I enjoyed waking up with." Even over the crowd's noise, Elizabeth heard his quietly spoken afterthought. "Maybe that'll be the determining factor. I'll know I'm in love when it's that woman I want to wake up with every morning."
For a moment their eyes locked and held. It was Matt's voice that finally broke the compelling stare. "Hey, look, Thad."
The boy's face was a mask of red and black paint, broken only by his wide, gap-toothed grin. Megan had had her face done like a pierrette doll with eloquently tearful eyes and a red heart for a mouth.
"Megan, you look great!" Thad exclaimed. "But where the devil is Matt?"
The boy lapsed into a fit of giggles and cannoned into Thad's chest. When the hilarity had died down, Megan asked, "Have you finished your coffee yet?"
Thad glanced at Elizabeth and shrugged helplessly. "Yes, we're finished," he told the impatient children. He helped Elizabeth out of her chair. Bending his head close to hers in order to make himself heard, he said, "Should we take in the outdoor events?"
"I suppose so. If for no other reason than to justify Matt having to bring his jacket."
Laughing, Thad put his arm across her shoulders and gave her a quick hug. The gesture was friendly, not seductive. There was no reason for her heart to skip several beats. None whatsoever. A man didn't mention the women he slept with to one he wanted to take to bed. He discussed past affairs with a buddy, a pal. If this relationship developed into anything, that's the direction it would take. They would be friends, not lovers.
But apparently Thad didn't know that. "Careful," he said when she stumbled on uneven pavem
ent in the playground. He slid his fingers between hers and linked their hands. Her arm became sandwiched between his arm and his side. His elbow pressed an indentation at least an inch deep into her breast. Occasionally, and she was certain accidentally, the back of his arm grazed her nipple. Its invariable response shot to hell the palsy-walsy theory.
"Can we go on the hayride, Mom?"
"Sure." Her voice was reedy and thin.
The two children scrambled aboard the horse-drawn wagon. The driver said, "Sorry, but I can't take responsibility for the kids unless at least one parent goes too."