by Wendy Wax
“Want please, such good customer, but kitchen way behind. I go check.”
Miranda stepped out of line and back into the empty spot near the fish tank. Her friend had rolled over onto his back and seemed to be staring up at the ceiling. Every once in a while his tail fin moved, but the other fish were giving him a pretty wide berth.
Unable to stand the look in the fish’s eye, Miranda glanced up over the tank into the main dining room, where all twenty tables were occupied. Her gaze skidded to a stop when it collided with Blake Summers’s.
She would have turned and run if she’d had any hope of getting out of there without looking like she was turning and running. She’d already backed up against the fish tank as tightly as she could without joining her walleyed friend.
Before she could think, she heard Ling Pow’s voice beside her. “I put in usual order,” he said. “Let me find place to sit. You eat now.”
“No, I want to—”
“She can join us.”
Miranda whipped her head around at the sound of Blake Summers’s voice.
“No, I . . .” Their game of vehicular follow-the-leader was still fresh in her mind. She definitely didn’t want to have a meal under his sharp-eyed scrutiny.
“Good. Good. You go sit. I get food.” Ling Pow turned and headed back to the kitchen.
“It’s okay,” Blake assured her. “We almost never bite.”
She suspected that was exactly what they were going to tell the floater in the fish tank right before they reached in with the net. Nonetheless, she followed Blake to the table where he pulled out her chair and Gus greeted her warmly. After a polite hello Andie buried her face in her menu.
“I almost didn’t recognize you without your hair,” Gus said.
Miranda ran a hand down the bare neck she was still getting used to. “Yes, well, it’s still me.” She smiled at Andie who, if she wasn’t mistaken, was trying to become invisible. “Hair doesn’t make the woman any more than clothes make the man.” Though apparently lingerie sometimes did.
“Why the haircut?” Blake asked.
“I’m going through a sort of . . . corporate phase.”
She kept her tone purposely flip, the carefree housewife trying on business for a lark. It wouldn’t do to sound too desperate around Blake Summers; but she hadn’t meant to sound quite so inane, either. There was something about the man that made her want to babble.
Blake shot Gus a look. Andie had turned her attention to a pamphlet of Chinese proverbs that Ling Pow left on each table. The girl was still a novice in the art of makeup application, but the mascara made her blue eyes pop, and the pale pink lipstick and blusher added a nice glow to her skin. Miranda would have liked to bring up the prep class so she could avoid the subject of her absent husband and ailing company, but Andie was acting as if they’d never met.
“Tom’s in China right now visiting small manufacturing towns,” Miranda volunteered unnecessarily. “It could take a while.”
She was saved from further babbling by Ling Pow’s arrival with their food.
“Always like see big smile on best customer,” he said before bowing his way back from their table.
“So just how often do you eat here?” Blake asked, his tone still casual.
Miranda ate her soup as she considered the question. “Oh, I don’t know, two or three times a week, I guess, if you include takeout. It depends.”
“On what?”
She finished another spoonful of soup. “On, uh, Tom’s schedule.” Strange how difficult it was becoming to think of him in the present tense.
It hit her then how seldom she and Tom had dined at home alone. At some point it had gotten hard to keep the conversation going, and they’d begun eating out with others. Or popping into the club for a bite, where they’d be sure to run into someone they knew.
Then there were the nights Tom had worked unexpectedly through dinner. She looked up to find Blake studying her.
“Have you spoken to Tom lately?” he asked quietly.
Ling Pow arrived with her main dish, and Miranda busied herself passing back her empty soup bowl and taking a sip of freshly poured tea. When she finished, Blake was still waiting for her answer, his blue-eyed gaze fixed on her face.
“Actually, I speak to him regularly,” she lied baldly. “When he’s in some of the less-developed areas communication is more difficult.”
“I see.” Blake took a sip of his tea but kept his gaze locked with hers.
Miranda slipped her chopsticks out of their paper holder and imagined Blake Summers’s reaction if she were to tell him her husband had left her and wasn’t coming back. Maybe she’d reveal that part now and save the fraud and impending bankruptcy part for dessert.
Then she could ask him whether he preferred briefs or boxers, on the grounds that she didn’t want to be attracted to another man who might own prettier underwear than she did. Attracted?
He took a bite of what looked like chicken with cashew nuts, and Miranda watched the food slip between his lips. In between her own bites she watched him ply his chopsticks with ease, watched the food travel up and into his mouth. Watched him . . . hokay . . . she tore her gaze from his lips and searched her brain for a topic that wouldn’t lead to her abandonment, the state of Ballantyne, or what he might look like without any underwear on at all.
“I’m so glad Andrea decided to take my Rhododendron Prep class.”
Both men’s heads popped up and Andie froze in mid-chew.
“What did you say?” Blake asked.
“I said, I’m glad Andie’s in my Rhododendron Prep class.” She looked at the three shocked faces and her speech slowed. “I, uh, definitely think it will be a great experience for her.”
Blake did a double take worthy of a Looney Tunes episode. “Are you talking about my Andie?”
Andie winced and swallowed as he pointed toward her.
“This Andie?”
“That would be the one.”
“You’re telling me that my daughter, who leads the NCAA in free throws, and who is going either to Duke or Chapel Hill on a full athletic scholarship, is preparing to be in a . . . beauty pageant?”
He said “beauty pageant” in exactly the same way one might say “lap dancing” or “drug smuggling.” Miranda bristled.
“She’s not actually required to enter the pageant, but my class will prepare her for it if she should choose to, yes.”
“We’re not talking Future Serial Killers of America here.” Miranda laid a hand on the girl’s arm. “Andie’s a lovely young woman. There’s no reason in the world why she shouldn’t learn how to present herself as one.”
“It’s no big deal, Dad.” Andie’s face was flushed with embarrassment. “I just wanted to learn some, you know, girl kind of stuff.”
They were spared from hearing how he felt about girl stuff by the arrival of Ling Pow, who took the remains of their dinners and left the bill. Miranda and Blake both reached for it.
Blake’s hand was warm against hers, and Miranda almost jumped at the unexpected contact. Blake reacted too, and they both said, “I’ll take care of it.”
Gus guffawed. “I got it.” He plucked the slip of paper out of their frozen fingers. “But you two need to simmer down. Nobody’s goin’ anywhere ’til they open their fortune cookie.”
He opened his first and read, “‘The road to forever is traveled one day at a time.’” Augustus nodded his head solemnly. “What’s yours say, Andie?”
Andie squinted at the thin rectangle of white paper. “‘Your game of life will be long and exciting.’” The girl rolled her eyes.
The old man motioned to Miranda, and she ripped the cellophane off her cookie and broke it open. Heat stole up her neck and across her cheeks as she read, “‘One must throw out the old in order to embrace the new.’” Gee, maybe Tom had gotten this one and taken it to heart.
Without prompting, Blake pulled out his sliver of paper. With a slow smile he recited the words alleged
ly baked into his fortune cookie. “‘Things are seldom what they seem,’” he said, nailing Miranda with those outrageous blue eyes. “‘But given time and patience . . . you will divine the truth.’”
chapter 10
T he bills were spread across the dining-room table. Miranda had hoped that stacking them by category would make the piles appear smaller, but the opposite was true. There were the household expenses, which she’d never looked at all at once before and never wanted to again. Plus the club and both cars; she was still making the payment on Tom’s Mercedes for fear they might come to collect a car she wouldn’t be able to produce. Not to mention the loan on Tom’s fishing boat and the ongoing balances on their credit cards.
Tom’s paycheck, which was automatically deposited into their household checking account, was just enough to meet their regular monthly expenses. But with everything else wiped out, there was no room for error, no shopping for anything other than necessities, and no way to pay for a divorce attorney or a private investigator.
Was it just a month ago that her biggest worry was finding a stamp to pay a bill on time?
As she rearranged the stacks of bills, she noticed that the massive mahogany table, like everything else in the house, bore a fine layer of dust. Afraid to let the efficient but gossipy Maria in the house to spread word of Tom’s empty closet and dresser, Miranda had held the woman off, paying her not to come while the mess and dust grew thicker.
The matching china cabinet was equally dusty, its glass front so cloudy she could hardly see the collection of Limoges inside.
The Elizabethan dining suite had been carted to the new world by long-dead Smith ancestors. They were important family heirlooms, but she doubted Tom had given them so much as a passing thought on his way out of their life. He’d written them off just as he had her.
Stung, she went into the kitchen, came back with a dishrag, and began to wipe away the coating of dust. Then she found the Windex and cleaned the glass so she could see the china inside.
It was then that she remembered Grady Harris of Asheville’s Très More Galleries salivating after this very dining suite. Why, he’d been begging her to sell it since the first time he’d seen it.
Quickly Miranda toted up the dining suite’s worth in her mind. Then she moved into Tom’s study, where she eyed the old oak desk and the antique rifle cabinet with its carefully collected contents. There was a complete Victorian bedroom suite in the guest bedroom at the top of the stairs.
Miranda fought back the twinge of regret at the thought of parting with such prized possessions and focused on the sweet feeling of relief.
“Grady Harris,” she said out loud as she went to hunt down his business card, “this is going to be your lucky day.”
Andie finished basketball practice and left school for the short walk home. Lights glowed in the neatly tended houses she passed and smoke curled up from chimneys. Everything was brighter and cleaner here than in Atlanta, and though she’d complained bitterly at first about the slowness with which everything happened in Truro, she’d gotten kind of used to the more relaxed pace and quiet friendliness. Everybody knew your business, but they didn’t rub your nose in it too much. Here she was the chief’s daughter and Gus’s great-grandchild. Her mother called it Hicksville and refused to set foot in it, but Andie kind of liked it here. Not that she planned to mention that to her dad any time soon.
At the corner of Dogwood and Digby she heard someone coming up behind her and turned to see Jake Hanson eating up the sidewalk between them.
“Hey, wait up,” he shouted, and like an imbecile Andie looked all around her. She barely managed to resist pointing at her chest and saying, “Who, me?”
He smiled again when he reached her. “Where ya headed?”
“Home,” she said, only her voice got caught in her throat and it came out sounding more like “om.” “I mean, home. I’m going home.”
He smiled but didn’t laugh, and she liked the way his eyes twinkled without making fun.
“Want some company?” he asked.
“Okay.” Shrugging, she turned, and Jake fell in beside her. For once she was the one who had to take longer strides to keep up.
While they walked down Cedar Avenue, Andie tried to figure out what was supposed to happen next. She considered trying to make chitchat like she’d seen Mary Louise and her friends do with boys, but her mouth was too dry.
“You have practice today?” he asked.
“Yeah.” Okay, it was only one word, but at least she hadn’t tripped over it. Andie licked her lips and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other.
“We’re playing the Bobcats next week.”
She snuck a peek at him and her brain shouted at her to say something but it didn’t tell her what. “I, uh,” she cleared her throat, “I saw their shooting guard at the playoffs last year. He’s got a great hook.”
“Yeah, we came out ahead the last time we faced them, but it was close.”
Okay, this wasn’t so hard. This was basketball. She’d been talking sports with her dad since she was five. “How, um, how many points do you think they’ll score against you?”
Jake flashed really white teeth at her and then, miracle of miracles, he started to talk. For the next ten blocks he covered their chances to win district, and what he thought of every adversary he’d ever faced. He never bragged, and he even laughed at his own mistakes, which Andie really liked. Without realizing it she began to relax, so that when he asked her opinion she was able to answer freely. Before she knew it, they were having a conversation.
Too soon they were on Main Street and approaching the police station. Normally, she stopped in to say hi and get a snack from Mrs. Farnsworthy, or a ride home with her father. Today he was standing out front talking to the mayor. His eyes narrowed as she and Jake approached. Then his mouth stopped moving. The mayor turned to see what he was staring at.
Andie’s cheeks went hot and her toe caught on an uneven place in the sidewalk. Jake automatically reached out and grabbed her arm to steady her. Real shock registered on her father’s face.
Andie didn’t know what to do. After a quick moment of silent prayer, she fixed her father with a stare that said, “Don’t embarrass me or I’ll never speak to you again,” and slowed just a little.
“Hi, Chief. Hi, Mayor.” Jake’s tone was as casual as you please, but Andie could hardly breathe. She kept her gaze on her father, telegraphing her single all-important message, praying that just this once he wouldn’t feel the need to haul her over and put her through the third degree.
His lips parted as if to speak, and from behind Jake’s back, Andie silently, but adamantly, shook him off. She wanted to yelp with relief when he pressed his lips back together and did nothing more than nod politely and raise a lone finger to the brim of his hat.
Andie kept walking. As they passed, she lifted one hand in a very small wave. “Hi, Mayor. See you at home, Dad.”
She could feel her father’s gaze on her back all the way to Morrison, but he didn’t shout after her to come back or demand to know what she was doing walking with a boy. Andie vowed to put an extra dollar in the collection plate on Sunday now that she had proof there was a God.
On Friday evening Miranda made it home from her Rhododendron Prep group just before the caterer was due to arrive.
She raced around the house stashing things out of sight, wiping down countertops and laying a fire in the fireplace, then dashed upstairs to shower and change. By the time the committee members began arriving, her house looked like her house again. Her antiques, many of which were putting in their farewell performance before heading off to auction tomorrow, shone from a recent application of lemon oil. A fire flickered in the fireplace and a Norah Jones CD played softly from the sound system.
While a server passed samples of suggested hors d’ oeuvres, Miranda moved from group to group, a bottle of wine in each hand. As she circulated, she encouraged everyone to try each of the appetizers
, took note of their opinions, and pushed the wine at every opportunity. Getting this group to talk freely about their bras was going to require serious priming of the pump.
Soon the buzz of excited female conversation filled the room.
“Red or white, Angela?” Miranda asked.
“Goodness, I never can decide.”
“Maybe the white, then. There’ll be plenty of opportunity to try the red when we sample the entrees.”
“Red? But what if somebody spills it. Maybe I should choose a darker napkin. What if . . .”
“Angela,” Miranda said calmly, “I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but we don’t have to return the napkins in the same condition we get them. It’s okay if they get dirty.”
With a relieved smile, Angela tossed back her glass of wine with a speed that spoke of more experience than Miranda would have suspected. Without comment, Miranda continued working the room. She filled glasses and made chitchat, subtly introducing her thoughts and suggestions to the committee heads. The decibel level rose with each bottle of wine consumed, and when the committee members began threatening to undress in order to compare plastic surgeons, Miranda knew it was time to sop up some of the alcohol with food.
“Okay, everyone,” she said, “be sure to take at least a taste of everything so we can get a vote tonight.”
In the dining room the ladies flirted with Henri, whose European good looks and accent had helped make his catering business the most popular in three counties, then took their plates into the great room.
Angela Johnson stood and raised her wineglass. “I want to propose a toast to Henri,” she proclaimed, her normal reticence discarded several glassfuls ago.
The crowd cheered.
“So here’s to Henri.” She smiled gleefully. “His sausage is first rate.”
Titters greeted this drunken observation.
“And there’s nothing wrong with his prawns, either!” a voice from the back added.
Miranda swung her gaze around the room. Women lounged on every available flat surface, and every one of them was stuffed to the gills with fine wine and good food.