by Dana Roquet
I was shocked by everything that his kiss spoke of to me, of longing and a need that was raw, potent, exposed and directed toward me. I was overwhelmed by the intensity of those same emotions he was stirring in me and it was by a sheer force of will that I finally came to my senses and recognized that this was not right; I needed to stop this now because I had to remember that I was in an exclusive relationship with Derek and whatever else that meant, it required my loyalty and fidelity.
As I came crashing back down to earth and reason, I gently pushed against Dave’s powerful chest and his kiss ceased but he didn’t withdraw, not completely, his mouth hovered close to mine as if fighting against his desire to kiss me again, as if he wasn’t able to withdraw, until finally, breathing as heavily as I was, he opened his eyes and looked down into mine. His eyes were painfully honest before they cleared; his usual cordial amiability coming back to him and the Dave that I’d known before, gazed down at me.
He took a step back and straightened, seeming to realize as I had, the impropriety of what we had just shared and his mouth opened as if to speak but words seemed to fail him and his hands that had been holding me so close moments before, balled into loose fists at his sides as he stepped back further still.
“Jesus, Torie, I’m sorry—I—I—” he stammered shaking his head as though to clear it.
“No I’m sorry. I—I have to go,” I stammered in return, with my world reeling because I had glimpsed a profound depth of emotion in him that was far, far beyond my own meager ability or experience and that knowledge affected me more than I would like to admit. I quickly got into my truck and started it as Dave stood there and watched me drive away.
***
Dave watched as Torie sped away onto the main highway, kicking up a cloud of gravel and dust in her wake and he kept watching until she was out of sight before he turned, heading back down the alleyway and arriving on Pine Street just as the firemen were putting the last table onto a city truck and grabbing up the caution light barriers from the street. He found himself standing all alone on the very spot that had been a dance floor a short time before, remembering the dance that he and Torie had shared.
Her long auburn hair had spilled down her back and over his hands as he’d held her in his arms, enjoying every detail, from the fragrance of her perfume which was soft, light and clean, to the feel of her slim body that had felt as though it was made to be under his hands. Her large blue eyes had looked up into his; her full lips seeming to beckon him as the dance had ended and he had almost kissed her then. If he would have, he had no doubt now that it would have ruined everything and he would have missed out on the rest of their wonderful evening together.
It had taken all of his willpower to strike down his need and force his retreat from the passionate kisses that they had just shared—that he hadn’t wanted to let end. He could have held her in his arms and spent the rest of the night until dawn simply exploring the mysterious secrets of kissing her soft, soft mouth. Her response to him had been unexpected and stunning and his need had proved to be even greater than he had realized—he was absolutely starved for the intoxicating intimacy of a woman’s touch but not just any woman—it was Torie that he craved and his passion for her was maddening and ravenous. He needed to somehow find a way to curb his desire for her or he would lose her completely, even as a friend.
He could hear laughter and conversation coming from the open doors of Stevie’s and Tim’s Time Out, but he wasn’t in the mood. He crossed the street, heading for his truck which was parked behind Stevie’s, but as he passed the doorway, he heard a familiar voice.
“Cameron, get your ass in here!” Jeff Allman ordered loudly. “I need to buy you a drink, buddy. I got that roofing job, thanks to you.”
Dave stuck his head inside to see that the place was overflowing with rowdy partiers continuing where the street dance had left off.
“Just one,” Dave agreed, joining his best friend on a stool next to him at the bar.
“Deal! Steve, a Miller Light for Mr. Cameron, if you please. Okay, so I need to hear all about Torie Mills and you’re welcome for me leaving you two alone tonight. She’s a knock-out, huh?”
“Jeff, you have no idea,” Dave said with a derisive snort.
“Sounds like you’ve been bitten by love, old boy. About time you got back into the game. I was getting a little worried about you.”
Dave gave him a slow shake of his head. “Nah, she’s taken, but I’m more than bitten I’m afraid and I’m a glutton for punishment because I can’t seem to stay away from her.”
“Shit, ain’t that the way it always is?” Jeff clapped him on the shoulder affectionately and then turned, as he felt the brush of a newcomer arriving at the empty bar stool next to his own.
“Well, if it ain’t my prom date! Tammy, honey, how you been?”
“Jeffey, Dave, it’s like a high school reunion around here tonight, isn’t it?” she said with a laugh before calling loudly to be overheard over the roar of the other patrons. “Hey Steve, can I get a beer over here? So tell me, all y’all, what’s new?”
Chapter 14
July began with another short Midwestern book signing tour, beginning in Chicago. I was starting to sense a pattern here, and I wasn’t sure if Nancy just didn’t think that I would catch on, but I had! This was the second time in the last three months that I was spending at least part of my time on the road promoting my books and I wasn’t enjoying it, one bit. I got back home on July 8th late in the day.
When I landed at the airport in Des Moines and picked up my truck from the long-term parking lot, I then needed to make a stop in Oskie for some basic groceries to stock my cupboards and by the time I finally got home it was almost 9:00 p.m. I put away the milk and other perishables, leaving the rest of the groceries unceremoniously dumped on the kitchen island to deal with in the morning and without even unpacking my luggage I got ready for bed and climbed gratefully between the fresh cool linen sheets.
I was in such a desperate mood for a time warp that I didn’t care what or where it would happen to be; just somewhere pleasant was all that I was hoping for. It is always a total crapshoot when I time travel, as far as what I might experience but tonight I didn’t care if it meant something as mundane as a day of house cleaning with Grandma Alice or even darning socks with Grandma Rose in front of a cozy fire in the front room on a cold winter’s day (both of which I’d lived during previous warps) that would be fine by me—bring it on!
As I lay in my bed in the dark waiting to drift off and listening to the quiet of the house all around me, I suddenly realized that I hadn’t heard from Derek for three days now and I’d had no text messages from him tonight, not even just to see that I’d arrived home safely. Lately, I’d begun feeling very unsatisfied with my relationship with Derek when before now I’d felt as though he and I shared the perfect casual yet exclusive relationship and it had lasted for more than eleven months now which is so far beyond a record for me that—well, longer than ever before, that’s all.
I had felt that the relationship suited me perfectly because Derek is happy with things the way that they are, as far as keeping our own places, without the usually expected and always stifling, every night sleepovers. No shelf set aside in our medicine cabinets for each other’s articles, no prerequisite dresser drawer for the keeping of my things at his place or vice versa. These unspoken rules had allowed me to keep from feeling overwhelmed by too much together time and feeling like I am being smothered with a commitment pillow, like I’d always felt in my other too few to mention previous relationships. So now all at once I am starting to think and feel like the neglected little woman?
“Yes damn it!” I said out loud to the silent confessor of the dark room around me and to whatever ghosts of my ancestors might be listening in on my thoughts from the great beyond. “I have relationship issues—big time! There—I said it. Are you happy now?”
Silence and the movement of the whisper soft blades of the ceiling
fan swirling the air-conditioned breeze across my face was the only answer that I received. I wasn’t at all sure but had the thought occur to me that my dissatisfaction of my relationship with Derek might possibly be partly the fault of my deceased loved ones, who have been demonstrating to me on a nightly basis, lessons about how good relationships are done. I had seen a lot of what it can look like while observing the gentle courtesies, the comfortable and sometimes romantic gestures of the true loves between Rose and Judson, Henry and Alice, Arlan’s siblings and their spouses, usually while inhabiting one of the children of the Wyman or Mills families or other close relatives.
Completely unbidden, thoughts of Dave Cameron come to mind like a special delivery letter has been suddenly dropped into the palm of my hand and I left the thoughts of my relationship issues and Derek behind me and instead I savored and turn the memory over and over in my head of the last time that I’d seen Dave. It had been that night we had enjoyed together at the street dance and those few electrifyingly sex-charged minutes that we had shared as he had pressed me firmly up against the side of my truck and had taken my mouth so forcefully and so, so passionately. I could feel a throbbing need as I remembered his perfect, sweet mouth and those amazing kisses, and I reached down to press against the ache, contemplating as I did so that it had been too long and Derek wouldn’t be here until next weekend!
What? I immediately thought in amusement, replaying my own moronic internal dialogue. What the hell are you thinking, ‘too long’? It’s only been a few weeks for Christ’s sake. You can go weeks, you’ve gone months, no ‘actually’ you’ve gone ‘years’ without it and have done so more than once in your lifetime if you would care to recall.
“You need a reality check, Mills,” I said aloud with a derisive snort of laughter at myself and then determinedly putting all thought of those stimulating memories of Dave Cameron completely out of my mind, I flopped over onto my stomach, closed my eyes and waited for a time travel to take me away.
***
The next morning, it was cooler than usual for a mid-July day, so about mid-morning, I decided to get myself cleaned up and drive into Fremont to go on a little investigative tour, to check out some of the old buildings that occupied downtown, clustered around either side of the two bars.
The one-story structures, built at the turn of the century, had all been through many facelifts and modernizations, however, the brick façade of the current Stevie’s is still intact with “State Bank” and the year 1900 engraved upon a long rectangular piece of granite imbedded in the brick and centered in the lintel just above the door. The long defunct bank had been rebuilt after at least a couple of fires had destroyed it and most of the other old wooden structures along South Pine Street. Looking it over with a critical eye, I thought that this brick version of the bank building was still in pretty good shape.
Next along the street was the tiny telephone relay station and beside that, the adorable little Fremont post office if a building could be called adorable. It is a tiny little structure set back from the street and with a small lawn of green grass that measures about ten by twelve and is edged with a tiny little concrete sidewalk that leads to the tiny little door—yeah, pretty darned adorable.
I was strolling on, enjoying the little details of the architecture from another era, when the next building caught my eye and held my interest because of the covered plate-glass window and lack of a name of business anywhere to testify as to what sort of commerce might be being conducted inside. I used my hand to shield my eyes from the glare of the sun reflecting off of the glass and peeked through the sagging edge of an old rattan rolling shade that hung off-kilter and allowed me to get a look inside the room.
It had obviously been closed up for a number of years and it looked as though the occupants had simply closed the door one day and never returned. A thick layer of undisturbed dust blanketed the wooden cabinets of two ornately carved, turn of the century upright pianos in varying states of disrepair. There were tools scattered about on both of the closed wooden keyboard guards and strewn upon the floor.
I shifted my position to look to the left side of the room as far as the broken shade would allow and could see that just inside the door was a reception area. On the edge of an old black metal desk that was covered by a leather blotter holding a large inset calendar, sat a black, chunky old-fashioned dial telephone with a cup of pens and pencils and a small note-taking pad close at hand. If not for the ancient telephone from likely the 1950’s and the thick layer of dust over everything which looked as if a vacuum cleaner bag had exploded spewing its contents over the entire scene, I could almost believe that a secretary might have just stepped out for a bite of lunch.
“Hey, lady.”
So preoccupied was I with the old office that I jumped as if I’d been stuck by a pin and turned with my heart racing to find that Dave’s black truck had pulled up along the curb behind me without my realizing.
“Hey, Mr. Cameron,” I croaked with my hand over my chest as my heart restarted after the shock. “You startled me.”
“Sorry about that,” he apologized with a chuckle.
I approached the passenger side of the vehicle and saw that Dave was not alone and his passenger grinned at me amiably. He was probably in his mid-thirties with short light brown hair, warm nutmeg-brown eyes and was equally as tanned and toned as Dave, however his muscular arm that was draped along the truck window edge was covered by a full sleeve of black tattoos in a variety of geometrical and tribal themes.
I looked beyond him to the driver’s seat and eyed Dave, waiting for him to make the introductions. I noted as I looked upon Dave’s familiar face that he didn’t resemble the sex god of my imaginings last night in bed. He was just the Dave that I’d always known, handsome and sexy—yes, but my friend and clearly, by the easy smile he gave me now, we weren’t going to have any lingering awkwardness about that night at the street dance.
“Jeff, this is Torie Mills. Torie, this is my best friend Jeff Allman and fellow Fremont alum.”
“Yes, of course. I recognize your name. It’s very nice to meet you, Jeff,” I said with true pleasure in my voice, as I extended my hand to shake his. His face altered to surprise, as he shook and continued to hold my hand, pumping it as he spoke.
“You recognize my name?” he said in shock.
“Oh, no,” I said with a laugh. “I mean your surname. Your family is in the cemetery with Dave’s and mine,” I explained.
“Oh, I see,” he said remembering himself and releasing my hand from his grasp. “Yes, we’re part of an elite group, aren’t we?”
“Are you descended from Jacob or Gottfried Allman?”
“Wow, I’m impressed—very good,” Jeff said with a nod of approval. “Gottfried.”
I nodded, tucking this bit of information away for my future use.
“Hey, maybe you guys know the answer to this,” I pointed over my shoulder to the building behind me. “What’s with this closed-up building? It looks to have been a piano repair shop or something. Have any idea?”
“To be honest that’s been closed since we were little kids,” Dave said, looking to Jeff for his confirmation.
“No idea on the story,” Jeff agreed with a shake of his head but then paused.
“But, hey,” he said turning his attention back to Dave. “What about Bill? I’ll bet he knows,” Jeff said and regarded me again. “You should stop in at the barbershop and ask him because Bill knows everything about Fremont. He’s the old sage, you know—keeper of the stories.”
“Really?” I said with interest while pondering silently, thinking about all of the questions that my time travels were adding to my genealogy records. Maybe this Bill fellow held some of the answers to those questions.
Dave pointed over his shoulder and down the street toward the last small brick building on the west side of the business district. Just beyond that point was a gravel road and beyond that, a farm and pastureland that was full of a herd of cattle,
contentedly grazing.
“Thanks. I’ll stop over there and see if he knows. So what are you guys up to today?”
“We’re just taking advantage of this cool weather.” Dave said. “We’re tackling a reroof job, or I should say that Jeff is. I signed on to assist.”
“It’s a great day to be outside,” I agreed. “I’m just piddling around here. I think I’ll see if Bill knows anything about the old Olive Branch schoolhouse that we’d talked about finding, while I’m at it. He might know where it was located.”
“Oh shoot,” Dave said, his face falling. “I totally forget that I was going to help you find that some weekend.”
“No biggie,” I assured him casually.
“If anyone will know for sure it’s Bill. Let me know what he says and I’ll help you find it. Just name the day,” Dave offered.
“I will,” I agreed with a nod.
“Well, we’d better be getting back at it.” Dave said apologetically.
“No problem, Dave. It was good to meet you, Jeff,” I said.
“You too, Torie; I’m sure we’ll meet again.”
***
As Dave’s truck pulled out onto Highway 23 and he honked a final farewell, I stepped off the curb and crossed deserted Pine Street heading down to the shop with the old-style, red-striped barber pole out front. I noticed as I approached, the bold red and blue soap lettering across the front window in sort of a horseshoe-shaped banner that read: “Fremont Hair Styling for Men” and below in italics and between apostrophes in red lettering ‘Bill’s Barber Shop.’
The tinkling chime on the door that sounded as I entered was hardly necessary because the moment that I crossed the threshold, I was standing smack dab in the center of the shop. No one inside could possibly miss me suddenly standing in their midst.
