Aggie sat, her silence acknowledging the truth of everything Cory had said. “What did you want the money for?” she asked, abashed.
“I wanted to take you out for your birthday,” Cory said. “They’re doing West Side Story at the Ohio Theatre this October.”
Aggie’s eyes filled with tears. “I love West Side Story,” she said softly.
“Surprise.”
Aggie chuckled, wiping her eyes. “I’m sorry.”
Percival trotted over, snuffling in concern as he placed his front paws on Aggie’s knee. “I’m fine,” she murmured. Reassured, he went back to chasing squirrels.
“What would you think,” Aggie said hesitantly, avoiding Cory’s gaze, “if I were to give up my apartment and move in here with you?”
Cory was quiet for so long that Aggie thought she must be angry or upset with the suggestion.
“You… you would do that?” Cory asked.
Aggie shrugged. “I pay rent for an apartment I’m hardly ever at. I could use that money to take care of some repairs around here. And if you needed to go somewhere – like the bank,” she said pointedly, “I could drive you.”
Cory laughed and then became quiet, pensive. “I wouldn’t want you to feel trapped,” she said at last.
“And I wouldn’t want you to feel like I was invading your space,” Aggie said.
* * *
Corinne walks into her bathroom and nearly breaks her neck when she slips on a towel left lying on the floor. Shaking her head, she hangs it on a towel rack. Glancing back out into the sitting room, she hardly recognizes her own apartment.
Cast-off clothing covers nearly every surface. Helen’s suitcases lie open on the floor so that Corinne has to pick her way carefully to get to the kitchen without tripping. The kitchen itself is a disaster, with nearly every cup, plate and piece of silverware she owns littering the tiny counters and sink.
“Haven’t you ever cleaned or picked up after yourself?” she’d asked Helen in exasperation about two weeks after she’d moved in.
“No,” said Helen, sounding as if that were the most preposterous thing she had ever heard. “I’ve always had staff to do that.”
“Well, I am not your staff,” Corinne had said, picking up an armful of clothing and handing it to Helen to be put away.
Not that it does any good, she thinks now, shaking her head again.
With a quick glance at the clock, Corinne realizes she’ll be late to work if she doesn’t hurry. For Helen, getting to her new job on time seems to be the only thing she is capable of. She loves her exciting position working with one of the war offices, translating sensitive documents. “I can’t tell you what they are,” she’d said apologetically after her first week.
“I didn’t ask,” said Corinne stiffly, feeling a little put off that Helen found her new work so much more interesting and important than working in the census office.
Helen seemed to have realized what she’d done. She took Corinne by the shoulders and said, “I’ll take you out to dinner with my first paycheck.”
Corinne’s face broke into a reluctant smile and she’d looked brazenly up into Helen’s eyes, enjoying this game of flirting that they’d adopted. “Deal.”
Standing in the shower now, she shivers in anticipation of their dinner tonight. The last couple of months since Helen moved in have awakened feelings Corinne has never experienced before. In such a small apartment, it has been impossible not to see things: Helen naked and damp as she steps out of the bathroom to dress in the sitting room; Helen peering into the bedroom and staring at Corinne as she lies there, pretending to be asleep. Corinne runs the bar of soap over her breasts and down between her thighs, and she feels again that tingle in her belly, and she knows that she wants to feel Helen’s hands touching her in all those places.
Rushing about, she hurriedly picks up what she can so that there is a clear path for them to negotiate when they return to the apartment that night. Looking back, she blushes and smiles to herself as she realizes the path leads to the bedroom.
* * *
Cory smiled fondly at Aggie. “One of the best things ever to happen to me came when someone invaded my space. I’d love to have you live here.”
Chapter 10
“Come on, you wimp,” Ridley taunted. “Ten more.”
Beryl grunted as she forced out ten more sit-ups before dropping back to the mat, wrapping her arms around her middle. “Oh, I’m going to die,” she moaned.
“No, you won’t. You’re not that lucky,” he said unsympathetically.
In response to her complaint about being fat, he’d said, “That we can do something about.” He was training her, “Marine-style,” he said. “No wussy machines. Push-ups, pull-ups, lunges, squats.” Her body was screaming, but already she could feel a difference in the way her clothes were fitting.
Ridley was, literally, awe-inspiring. He cranked out twenty-five and thirty pull-ups, did push-ups balancing on his right foot and did a variety of abdominal exercises that Beryl could only dream of someday doing.
Sometimes, when he was exercising, she could see the glint of something in his eyes as he tried to work his body hard enough, make it hurt badly enough to drive out the things that haunted him. He’d shared only a few with Beryl: the twelve-year-old boy his patrol had watched drop to the ground in front of them, shot in the head by a sniper because he’d become friendly with the Americans; his buddy who’d been blown up by a female suicide-bomber pretending to be pregnant. “We found a few bits of him to send home to be buried at Arlington,” he said.
But, most of the time, he was gentle and soft-spoken, more a librarian than a Marine.
“Let’s call that auction house,” he had suggested the day after their dinner.
Beryl dug around in her backpack and found the information Mr. Herrmann had given her. Ridley found the auction house listed on the internet.
“Here’s the phone number,” he pointed. “Call them.”
Nervously, Beryl dialed the number from her cell phone. “Hello,” she said when someone answered. “I don’t know if you can help me, but I need to try and track down the origins of some items you auctioned back on…” she checked Mr. Herrmann’s notes, “June 13th.”
The person on the other end must have requested the lot numbers, because Beryl read them off, then there was silence for awhile.
“Oh, thank you,” she said, and gave her name and cell number. She turned to Ridley. “They’re going to have to research it and get back to me.”
Ridley seemed as intrigued as she was by who Helen and Corinne might have been. When they had quiet moments behind the reference desk, which wasn’t often, he enjoyed speculating about their story.
“Claire thinks I’m being foolish,” she offered, “just making up a romance.”
Ridley snorted derisively. “There’s nothing wrong with romance,” he said.
He didn’t like Claire, but “he doesn’t know her,” Beryl kept reminding herself. “He only knows what I’ve told him.” And she felt guilty about that. “What kind of person talks about the one they love?” she asked herself. “But do you?” asked that other insistent voice, the one Beryl wouldn’t listen to.
The auction house didn’t call back for three days. “It looks like those boxes as well as several other things were purchased by our buyer at an estate sale run by… Mattingly Auctions in… Columbus, Ohio,” read the woman who called. “On March 20th.”
Beryl jotted as the woman spoke. “Thank you so much,” she said as the woman finished.
“So, another search,” Ridley said, reading over her shoulder. “The mystery deepens,” he said dramatically. “Let’s call them.”
“Later,” she said, folding the paper.
“Why later?” he asked, puzzled. “Don’t you want to find them?”
Beryl frowned down at the folded paper. “Yes, but…” How to explain that Corinne and Helen had become her lifeline, that she’d come to think of them as friends? What if
Claire was right? What if the inscription hadn’t really meant anything, and it was just a fling? Beryl wanted – needed – to believe it had been more, and part of her didn’t want to know the truth if it hadn’t.
Somehow, Ridley seemed to understand these things without being told. “How about you take me to The Scriptorium after our workout today?”
Beryl raised her eyes hopefully. “We could go instead of our workout.”
He gave a bark of laughter. “Good try, Gray. But no. After the workout.” He wheeled back over to his computer. “Unless you had other plans for later.”
“No,” Beryl sighed glumly. “I’m supposed to meet Claire for dinner at seven. That probably means Leslie will be there, too.”
Ridley was quiet for a minute. “Where are you meeting for dinner?”
“A Mexican place near DuPont Circle,” she said.
“Mind if I invite myself along?” he asked nonchalantly.
She looked over at him, immediately suspicious. “Why would you want to do that?”
He grinned mischievously. “Just curious to meet the great and terrible Claire.” At the dubious expression on her face, he held up his hand. “I promise to behave myself. Marine’s honor.”
“Uh, yeah,” she said skeptically.
If Beryl had thought Ridley would ease up on the intensity of their workout now that they had plans, she was wrong. By the time they were done, her legs were trembling so that she wasn’t sure they would support her, but she couldn’t even complain when Ridley growled, “Just be glad you’ve got legs to exercise.” Even he managed to do more with one partial leg than most people could do with two.
He insisted on driving them to DuPont Circle. “This makes it a whole lot easier,” he said, tapping the handicapped tag dangling from his mirror. He rarely used handicapped spaces on campus. “Don’t need to,” he said when asked why. “But in D.C., all’s fair,” he claimed as he engaged his hand controls to back out of his space.
Having found a parking spot less than a block from the bookstore, he pulled his crutches out and slung his messenger bag over his chest. As she’d known he would, Ridley loved the bookstore. Mr. Herrmann and George were charmed by him. In fact, Beryl caught George watching him covertly through gaps in the bookshelves, and she found herself wondering if Ridley was gay. For some reason, it hadn’t occurred to her before. He’d never talked about dating anyone, or about any relationships at all, but she wondered now if that’s why he seemed to understand her so well.
Mr. Herrmann found her in the fiction section while Ridley looked through history.
“So, my dear,” said Mr. Herrmann secretively, “is this young man someone special?”
Beryl was so startled at the question that she didn’t know what to say at first. “No! I mean, he’s a friend. He’s… he’s my best friend,” she realized. She couldn’t remember the last close friend she’d had. Pre-Claire, certainly.
“I only ask because there is a certain glow about you today,” Mr. Herrmann said, his eyes twinkling.
“It’s sweat,” Beryl nearly blurted, but, “He’s just a friend, Mr. Herrmann,” she insisted.
When they left the shop almost an hour later, Beryl with two books, Ridley with five, it was with a promise to come again soon. Beryl covered a smile as she saw George watching them through the window.
Ridley deposited his books in his car, deciding to leave it in its current parking spot and switching back to his wheelchair to travel the few blocks to the restaurant.
“Did you tell Claire I was coming?” he asked curiously as he wheeled himself along.
“No,” Beryl said, “but we’ll arrive first –”
“So we can dictate the terms of battle,” Ridley finished for her.
She laughed nervously. “This is not war.”
* * *
A couple of hours later, she wasn’t so sure. Dinner had been – “a disaster,” Claire would have said, “spectacular,” Beryl would have said.
Ridley was gracious enough upon meeting Claire and Leslie, but for the remainder of their meal, he had focused solely on Beryl. I think he’s flirting with me, she thought, blushing a little, but as she’d never had a man flirt with her, she wasn’t certain. He engaged her in conversation, a rare occurrence as she usually sat, silent and excluded, while Claire and Leslie talked around her – “through me,” Beryl had often felt.
Beryl could sense Claire becoming sulkier and it only seemed to encourage Ridley more. He avoided mention of their workouts – Beryl had wanted to keep those secret – but kept Beryl talking about the library, research, old books, current world events – topics that highlighted her intelligence and insight.
“He was obnoxious,” Claire grumbled as she drove them home. For some reason, Leslie was still with them. She’d started going for the passenger door, but Beryl, newly emboldened by Ridley’s attention, pushed ahead and beat her to it, leaving Leslie no choice but to get in the back seat.
I am not going to have this conversation with her sitting back there, Beryl thought. Aloud, she asked innocently, “Where are you dropping Leslie off?”
“I thought she could –” Claire began, but, “My car is at work,” Leslie said moodily. “You can drop me off there.”
Beryl could feel them watching one another in the rear-view mirror and resolutely turned away, staring out her window and holding tightly to how Ridley had made her feel. “Don’t look,” she said to herself. “Don’t look.”
* * *
“She didn’t like me, did she?” Ridley asked with ill-disguised delight the next day.
“No,” Beryl admitted. “Did you have to antagonize her?”
His expression became serious. “I’m sorry if I made things worse for you, but listen,” he said, wheeling nearer to her, “don’t you see? I didn’t say anything unkind to her or Leslie. All I did was concentrate on you, and that, just that, was enough to piss her off. She wasn’t the center of attention and she wasn’t in control. And she didn’t like it.”
Beryl couldn’t come up with a response. Everything he’d said was true.
“How do you handle arguments with her? The ones you win?” he asked curiously.
“I don’t,” Beryl said, startled at the question. “Claire always wins arguments.” She shrugged. “She sees things, knows things. She’s always right.”
Ridley’s expression was comical as he snorted in incredulity. “No one is always right. It’s not possible to always be right.”
Beryl looked down at her hands, her hair swinging forward. “Well, I still don’t win arguments. It’s easier to just let it drop.”
Ridley sat back, his head tilted to the side in an expression of bemused disbelief. “You really don’t see it, do you? You’re brilliant. You’re funny. You can discuss anything under the sun. You’re ten times the person Claire is.” Beryl reddened, but didn’t say anything. “That’s our next job – getting you to believe in yourself, Marine.”
“I’m not a Marine,” she reminded him.
“You’d have made a terrific Marine,” he insisted, “in every way that counts. I’d have you cover my back anytime, Gray.”
“Ooorah,” she mumbled.
Ridley laughed and gave her an affectionate slap on the back.
* * *
Over the next days, Claire continued to denigrate Ridley every chance she got. Beryl didn’t respond, though she felt disloyal at not coming to Ridley’s defense. Part of the reason she never won arguments with Claire was that she’d learned long ago that arguing only made Claire dig in harder. Ironically, the more Claire tried to tear Ridley down, the less effect it had on Beryl. Ridley’s words had seeded a kernel of something in her – a something that had taken root and provided her with a kind of shield she’d never had before. It was as if Claire’s words simply bounced off. Claire seemed to sense this also, and changed tactics.
“I don’t have anything going on the next couple of evenings,” she said over a rare dinner at home with just the two of
them. “I could come with you to your parents’ for dinner this week.”
Beryl nearly choked. “Uh, that’s okay. I know you don’t really like being around them.”
Claire’s eyes narrowed the tiniest bit, but her face, instead of becoming angry or upset, became mask-like. She doesn’t even know she does it, Beryl thought, but it was her signal to tread carefully.
“You don’t want me to come?” Claire asked.
Beryl paused. “Don’t react the way you always react,” she said to herself. “Why do you want to come now?” she asked. “You haven’t come with me to see my parents for months. Not since Christmas, in fact.”
“You’re always after me to go,” Claire said. “I just thought –”
“Where’s Leslie this week?” Beryl asked unexpectedly.
It was Claire’s turn to stammer, “Uh, her in-laws are visiting from Minneapolis.”
“I see,” Beryl nodded, and she did see, suddenly. Leslie was off with the husband, pretending everything was normal while the in-laws were around, and Claire now had time for Beryl. She picked up her dishes, carrying them into the kitchen.
“You never answered me,” Claire said.
“Yes, I did,” Beryl said. “I asked you why you wanted to come now, and you couldn’t come up with a good reason.”
“What’s gotten into you?” Claire demanded as Beryl headed toward the stairs.
“Nothing,” Beryl shrugged. But as she headed up the stairs, she breathed, “Ooorah.”
Chapter 11
“Are you sure about this?” asked Aggie’s mother, Debbie, as she carried an armful of clothes upstairs to Aggie’s new bedroom.
Movers had the bedroom furniture in place in what had been Terrence’s room.
“Yes, believe it or not,” Aggie said, surprised herself. “It usually takes me ages to make decisions, but this one just fell into place.”
Debbie pushed her hair back into place. She was not accustomed to exerting herself except on the tennis court. “Your father doesn’t think this will last, not that his opinion matters very much.”
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