“Hmm,” I shook my head. “Maybe she’s in cahoots with Becky.” The nervousness I’d felt around him yesterday while we had lunch seemed less somehow. “Becky’s been asking if she can be a bridesmaid at our wedding.”
“Maybe they are in cahoots,” he lifted his brow into a succession of wrinkles.
“Well,” I traced my fork through a pattern of noodles and sauce. “At least they’re positive, I guess.”
I was relieved when his face lit up with laughter. “There is that to consider.”
Just as I was about to take another bite there was a loud thump upstairs. Both of our necks craned toward the ceiling, and my already jumbled insides felt cold.
“What now?” I untangled my legs and pushed away from the table.
“Do you guys have a cat?”
“No, Dad’s allergic,” I started toward the stairs. “I’ll be right back.”
Before I could dissuade him, he stood as well and was right behind me on the staircase. “I’ll come with you.”
“It’s probably nothing,” nothing but the ghost of my mother rattling her chains in the sewing room again, I thought.
“Well, just in case then.”
My first stop was the sewing room, but even after cautiously pushing the door open to peer in, it only took a quick sweep of the eye to see that everything there was in order. The sewing machine remained unplugged; I could see the cord sticking out from under the legs. All of her totes were stacked just as I’d left them. I moved next to Dad’s bedroom, thinking maybe I’d left a box unsteady on the dresser or something, but I took everything out with me on my last trip. There wasn’t a single item out of place.
Troy stood back as I checked the closet and peeked into the bathroom. The last room to check was my own. I reached for the doorknob, hand shaking as I gripped the cold metal and turned to the right. The door swung open and I stepped back with a gasp. My suitcase fell off of the hope chest, but how that managed to make such a sound I’d never understand because it was empty.
And that was even stranger because it shouldn’t have been empty since I washed most of my dirty clothes the day before and packed them into my suitcase so I’d be ready to leave. The clothes were gone, and as I searched the room the top dresser drawer stuck out on the left side just enough to catch my eye.
“What was it?” Troy leaned in and rested a careful hand rested on my shoulder.
Dry throat and shaken, I walked toward the dresser and gave a pull to tug it open. Neatly folded in the top drawer were all my socks and underthings. I pulled the second drawer open to find my shirts, and the third contained my pants. I pulled closet doors open to find the source of the commotion. The speakers stacked in there from my old stereo were knocked over, and swinging on hangers were the three dresses I brought with me.
“Janice? What’s wrong?”
I drew in a troubled breath and held it for a moment. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I mumbled, easing the fold out doors closed again. “It looks like the stuff in the closet was knocked over.” I avoided his eyes as I turned around shaking my head.
“Hey,” he grabbed onto my wrist and drew me close, lifting my face to his with the other hand. “You look really shaken, are you sure you’re all right?”
I was sure he’d pick up on my reluctance when my eyes darted quickly away from his, and then back again. “It’s fine, just a mess in the closet, no big deal.”
I watched the features of his face distort with concern, his eyes narrow and his brow creasing again. The left corner of his mouth pulled inward as though he were really thinking about my answer, and wasn’t sure he believed it. “Okay.”
“Maybe I was just looking for a way to get you into my bedroom,” I started to draw away, but his hand on my mid-back still held me close.
“And now that we’re here?”
I leaned up on my tip-toes and brushed my lips against his. Before I was able to pull away, he stole inward with an intense passion that ignited longing deep inside of me. I draped my arms around his neck and sunk into the comfortable way our bodies fit together even while standing.
Inspired by the moment, my thoughts roved over all the other ways I was sure we would fit perfectly together, like two halves of the same whole that had been searching an eternity for their counterparts. God, I was losing my mind, but I didn’t even want to care anymore. I just wanted him, all of him, body, mind and soul, but more than anything else I wanted his heart to beat against mine in a shared rhythm no one else in the world played a part in.
He already seemed to know me in ways no one else ever considered. He knew exactly how to respond to every kiss, just where and how to touch me, applying the perfect amount of pressure to make me come alive in his arms. I could hardly begin to imagine how perfect making love with him would be.
“Troy,” I whispered as his lips moved along the curve of my throat.
His kiss roamed upward until it met with mine again in an inquisitive, “Hmm?”
I took his hand and stepped backward toward the bed behind me. I hadn’t made it, of course, and my nightgown lay strewn across the pillows, which made me look like a complete and total slob. “You know what we were talking about last night?”
He was slightly dazed as he looked down at me and shook his head no. “We talked about a lot of things last night.”
“I mean about getting hurt.” I caressed his fingers with mine, circling my thumbs in patters over the inside of his palms.
“I remember,” his gaze met mine with such intense sincerity that I thought he would back away right then and there.
I drew in a deep breath, my stare unwavering as I admitted, “I’m not afraid.”
He lowered himself onto his knees in front of the bed so we were at eye level and cupped my face in his hands. I noticed they were trembling, and my heart ached inside with such deep emotion I thought I might cry. Troy looked over every inch of my face before he moved in and brushed his mouth to mine.
Eyes closed, he leaned his forehead against mine and said, “I am scared, Janice.” He swallowed. His hand, still shaking, slipped downward to rest on my shoulder. “I’m terrified that if I don’t seize every moment and make like it’s our last, I’m gonna wake up and find out this whole last week has been a dream.”
I lifted my hand against his cheek, drawing in unsteady breath and closing my eyes against the stinging threat. “If anybody’s been dreaming this last week, it’s been me.”
His tongue traced slowly over his bottom lip, “Well, here’s to hoping neither of us wakes up then.”
He moved inward slowly, this time drawing out our kiss in molten ceremony. For the first time he gave his hands the freedom to wander over places he’d been careful to avoid in the past. He lifted my t-shirt away slowly, holding it in his hand almost dazed as he looked down at me. I’d always been self-conscious of the smattering of freckles across my chest and shoulders, but he traced his finger deliberately across them, and looked up at me with a sheepish grin.
Each act unhurried, I worked at the buttons he had done half-way up the flannel he’d donned overtop of a thermal work-shirt. When he reached down to lift off his shirt, an appreciative grin spread across my face as the taut muscles of his stomach and chest flexed with the movement. I laid my hands against his warm, bare skin. The remnants of a summer tan, thanks to all those endless hours in the field, had only just begun to fade, but it was still golden and beautiful in comparison to the milky tone of my own skin.
I slid off of the bed and into his lap. Arms around his neck, the kiss that consumed us wasn’t enough to distract me from the evident fire now burning under my skin. He pushed himself off the floor and pressed tight against me, my back against the mattress behind me. With the calloused-tips of his fingers he left delicate traces of desire tingling across my flesh so that goose bumps rose in answer to his touch.
I had to be out of my mind, a guilty voice scolded. I hardly even knew him longer than a week, but desire lapped li
ke flame in protest…asking if I hadn’t known Troy nearly all my life? The boy who chased the girls at church picnics. The high school quarterback who’d been nursing a crush on me for eight years. The knight in shining armor who’d been there every time I’d needed someone to catch me when the grief became too much to bear.
Hungry mouths devoured every kiss while curious fingers crawled closer to the final bits of fabric separating us from the ringing of our souls… ringing? I leaned backward to listen, but Troy didn’t seem to have heard for he followed the movement in a line of hungry kisses along my neck.
“Troy, wait.” Alerted by my command, he sat back, head tilted in question and a flicker of embarrassed fear in his eyes. “I hear something…there it is.”
A deflated look contorted his features as he pushed back and reached into the front pock of his unbuttoned jeans and pulled out his phone with a heavy sigh. “I have to take it.”
“Go ahead.” I nodded. I slid up the mattress to resume my seat on the edge of the bed and watched him stand, flipping the phone open and lifting it to his ear.
“Yeah?” Even the way he stood there, one hand rested over the soft patch of gold hair trailing down his stomach, was breathtaking, and though I had a heavy feeling there would be no follow through on what had gotten started, a furnace was lit inside me that would take more than a cold shower to put out. He walked toward the door, one hand reaching out to rest against the frame. “I told Ed to call them out to readjust it on Monday. No, forget it, I’m on my way, just don’t touch any—” he paused and drew his arm out to look at his watch. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes, don’t touch anything, Mark.”
I hadn’t thought it was possible to slam a flip phone until that point.
Troy spun around, his face marred by a long, apologetic frown. “I am so sorry,” he shook his head. “One of the guys I hired this last summer… well, he’s a bit of an idiot, and it looks like I’m on my way to relieve him of his service.”
“Is everything okay?” I stood up and grasped his forearm in my hand.
“Yeah,” his face softened, and he slid in against me, lowering his lips against my forehead as he hugged me close. “It’s fine, nothing to worry about.” He lifted his fingertips slowly up my spine so that chills rippled through me. “I’m sorry.”
I leaned upward and kissed him. “It’s okay,” and despite the inferno lit to raging inside me, I assured him, “we have plenty of time.” As if in answer he kissed me back, a slow, simmering promise of a kiss that I would feel on my lips for hours after he’d gone.
I sat on the edge of my bed and watched him dress. When he pulled the flannel on over his work-shirt, I grabbed the hem and tugged him closer, carefully threading the buttons through their prospective holes while he looked on with a bemused grin.
He laid his hand down on top of my head and then slowly smoothed his fingers through my hair. “You are so beautiful.” His sudden compliment brought a lump to my throat, and the sincerity of it was backed by the intensity of those dreamy eyes. In the past I was told how beautiful I was on the threshold of a sexual encounter, perhaps even as one of those “seal the deal” compliments, but not after a failed attempt and never once it had been done.
I wrapped my fingers around his wrist and drew it against my lips. “When you say it, I believe it.”
“Good,” he drew me upward by my elbows and lifted me into one firm and final kiss. “Because it’s true. I’ll see you tonight, right?” He started to back away, his fingers still intertwined with mine.
“If it stops raining,” I gestured toward the window, continual rivulets of rain rushed against the glass.
“And if it doesn’t?”
“Call me.”
I retreated back to the edge of the bed as the sound of his work boots hammered down the stairs. With my t-shirt in my hand, I stood up when I heard the sound of his truck roar to life outside, and walked to the window. I thought I saw him glance up at me just before he pulled away, but I couldn’t be sure on account of the rainwater distorting the world below. Clutching my shirt in one hand, and the curtains in other, I thought about calling Becky, but what almost happened between us felt sacred and unfinished, and in the end I didn’t want to tell a single soul.
Ten minutes later I was on my way back downstairs to clean up lunch and was shocked when my dad came whistling through the back door with the paper under his arm and his lunchbox swinging. Upon realizing what might have transpired had Troy not gotten that phone call, a crimson heat moved into my face as I went about tidying up the table, scraping my uneaten lunch into the garbage before putting our dishes in the sink.
“Dad, what are you doing here so early?”
“We finished up early, so they let us go,” he said. “Looks like I arrived just in time though. I thought I passed young Mr. Kepner up the road there.” He looked over the table where less than an hour earlier Troy and I sat down to a lunch we’d never finish. “You two are the talk of the town, you know? Burt Myers saw you over at the Cineplex on Wednesday night. Said you looked pretty cozy. I’ve had half a dozen people at work ask me what’s going on between the two of you.”
“Good God,” I rolled my eyes and covered Mrs. Kepner’s baking dish with tinfoil before putting it in the refrigerator. “This town can’t stand it unless they’re in on everyone’s private business.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” he tucked his lunch box under the sink and stood up. He was quiet for a moment, and then cleared his throat before asking, “So, what is going on between the two of you?”
“Dad!” I turned from the refrigerator with my hand on my hip.
“Well, I am your father,” he pointed out. “I’m just looking out for my little girl.”
I laughed, “Of course you are. But really, I know you’re just digging for juicy bits to take with you to work on Monday morning.”
“Bah,” he waved his hand at me.
“Well, if you must know then, nothing is officially going on between us. We’ve been out together a few times, and we’ll probably go out again tonight and maybe even tomorrow. We’re spending some time together before I leave on Sunday, but it’s not a marriage proposal or a deep commitment. Just two people testing the water to see if they’d like to go swimming together.”
“Swimming, huh?” He cocked his left brow into an arc and smirked. “Is that what they’re calling it these days?”
“Dad!”
“What? When I was your age, we called that dating.”
“Whatever,” chuckling, I shook my head. “You were never my age, you old dinosaur.”
“Hey you!” He swatted his hand in my direction. “You watch that there, young lady.”
“Hey, Dad, can we talk about something serious for a minute?” I pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and sat down.
“Sure,” he followed my example, and put on a serious face. “What’s on your mind?”
“This is kind of weird, so don’t get all mad or freaked out, or whatever.” I started. “I think there’s something going on in the house.”
“Something? What kind of something?”
“I don’t know,” I looked down, not so sure if I could go through with the truth about what I’d been seeing. What if he didn’t believe me? “It’s hard to explain.”
“So take your time,” he urged.
“Dad, do you believe in spirits or ghosts or anything like that?”
“Jannie, I’ve lived in this house for more than a quarter of a century, and it’s never been haunted.”
“I know,” I nodded. “I lived here too, but what if something’s changed now? You know,” I urged him to think it through so I didn’t have to say that words out loud. “Since Mom has passed…” I added when he didn’t say anything.
“If this is about the sewing machine…”
“Dad, it’s been more than the sewing machine,” I assured him. “Tuesday night I came home and started up the stairs and there she was...” A chill moved through me al
ong with the memory. “Just standing there and she was reaching out for me saying something I couldn’t hear.”
He crossed his arms and pursed his lips tightly together, a bad sign that he wasn’t buying it. “Didn’t you go out drinking with your friend Becky Tuesday night?”
“Yeah, but I wasn’t drinking today when I went upstairs to find all of the clothes I packed into my suitcase put away in the drawers and closets.”
“What?” His brow shot upward, wrinkling his forehead. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No, I’m not kidding, Dad. Something strange has been going on in this house, and I think it is somehow connected to Mom, like she’s trying to tell me something.”
He shook his head, “Honey, I’m not saying I don’t believe you but…”
“But you don’t believe me?”
“It’s not that I don’t want to believe you, Jan, it’s just that... I don’t know. I haven’t seen or felt a thing out of place, other than that strange thing about the sewing machine.”
I nodded, “I understand if you don’t believe me, Dad, but I just really feel like she’s trying to reach out to me.”
“Maybe she is,” he started to push away from the table. “If she does manage to get a hold of you, ask her where she put my watch? I haven’t been able to find it since… well, you know.”
I bit down on the inside of my upper lip and nodded. The bite was meant to stifle any tears that might follow the awkward feeling of his not believing me. I tried to couple it with his longtime denial about God and church, and that made me feel a little better, but in the end I’d really been hoping that maybe he felt it too. I listened to the sound of his boots on the stairs, and then the bathroom door closed before I let go of the emotions bottled up inside me.
What if I was crazy, or if she wasn’t even trying to reach out to me, and it was all just some psychosis I was developing to make up for losing her. I drew in a sobbing breath and sighed, dabbing at the last of my tears with a napkin from the holder in the center of the table.
“If you’re really trying to reach me, Mom, where are you now?”
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