Going Back

by Judith Arnold

  Going Back

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  GOING BACK

  “Judith Arnold writes beautifully and poignantly. Highly recommended!” Romance Readers Anonymous

  Copyright © 1988 by Barbara Keiler

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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  To learn more about the author, and to sign up for her newsletter, please visit her website.

  Chapter One

  PHYLLIS HAD recommended this restaurant as a change of pace. Or, more accurately, a friend of a friend of hers had recommended it, and she had unilaterally decided that she, Andrea and Daphne ought to try it out. The three of them had been meeting for lunch at the same chic midtown Manhattan eatery on the first Wednesday of every month for the past two years and, not surprisingly, they were growing tired of it. The food there was expensive—Daphne was convinced that the price of each entree was fixed in reverse proportion to the number of calories in the entree. Since she spent at least half of her life on a diet, she usually wound up ordering a flimsy-looking salad, the price of which approached that of a new set of all-weather radials. She’d had no objection to trying someplace new.

  This highly touted restaurant, however, left something to be desired. It featured Indonesian fare. Daphne wasn’t sure what she was eating, but it tasted weird, spicy in flavor and slimy in texture. She picked at her food and consoled herself with the thought that eating nothing was even less fattening than eating flimsy salads.

  The cuisine notwithstanding, these monthly luncheons in the city were something Daphne greatly enjoyed. Phyllis and Andrea had been her closest friends at Cornell, and after their varied wanderings and their respective searches for themselves, all three of them had wound up living in the greater New York metropolitan area, Phyllis and her Significant Other on Long Island, Andrea and her husband in Manhattan, and Daphne in northern New Jersey.

  There were times when, faced with blizzard forecasts or tons of paperwork at the office, Daphne had mixed feelings about dragging herself into the city just to meet her old school chums for lunch. There were other times when Daphne found herself counting the weeks, the days, the minutes until she could reunite with her friends and let down her hair in a way she couldn’t with anyone else. And there were times like today, when the trio’s monthly luncheon was a pleasant diversion, something Daphne had looked forward to with neither obsession nor dread, but simply with appreciation of her immense good luck in having her friends living a manageable distance from her.

  Ever since their meals had been served, Phyllis had been describing her ongoing effort to convince her Significant Other, Jim, to marry her. “I still haven’t figured out if the new tax laws help or hurt my case,” she complained, prodding her spiced noodles with the tines of her fork. “Jim says we shouldn’t bother getting married because they’ve done away with the Schedule W deduction. I don’t know,” she concluded with a shrug. “I can’t help but think he’s handing me a line.”

  “Line twenty-seven, probably,” Daphne quipped. Having never been married herself, she had no idea which line of the 1040 the deduction for married couples used to be entered on. Whenever the subject turned to Jim—as it frequently did at these luncheons—Daphne usually thought it best to make jokes. If she didn’t, she’d probably wind up ranting about what a jerk Jim was. Phyllis was beautiful, intelligent, professionally successful—and incredibly dumb when it came to men.

  Not that Daphne was an expert on that particular subject. One of the differences between her and Phyllis was that Daphne would rather be by herself than invest her all in an unsatisfying relationship. One of the other differences was that, while Daphne was intelligent and professionally successful, she definitely was not beautiful, so the question of whether or not she’d choose to socialize with handsome but self-centered men like Jim was largely academic.

  “So what am I supposed to do?” Phyllis rotated her head so both Daphne and Andrea could view her glum expression. Phyllis’s little-girl pout was familiar to Daphne. Back in college, Phyllis had seemed to live from one melodramatic love affair to the next, and she’d had plenty of opportunities to perfect the pout. Her puckered pink lips and scrunched-up little nose made her look more adorable than pathetic.

  “Do you really want to know what you’re supposed to do?” Andrea asked, gesticulating broadly with her fork. “You’re supposed to say, `Jim, it’s been fun and it’s been swell, but now I’m ready to live like a normal human being, so please haul your ass out of here.” Andrea was a lot blunter than Daphne. She was also a lot messier. As she waved her fork, a strand of some unidentifiable slivered vegetable went flying off the end of it and landed on the floor just inches from Daphne’s foot.

  Daphne forgave Andrea. At least Andrea had good taste in men. Her husband was a sweetheart. Eric was generous, good-looking, and exceedingly tolerant of his sloppy wife. Not only that, but he earned enough as a tax consultant so that, combined with Andrea’s income as an assistant producer on one of the daytime talk shows produced in the city, they could afford an utterly beautiful, obscenely priced co-op on the Upper West Side. Andrea might not have had as many boyfriends as Phyllis in college, but quality was more important than quantity—and Eric was definitely quality. Daphne wouldn’t mind meeting a man like him one of these days.

  “I love Jim,” Phyllis declared staunchly. “I’m not going to ditch him just because he happens to believe—with some justification, I think—that marriage is an archaic ritual not necessarily appropriate for everyone.”

  “Spare us,” Andrea snorted. “I’ll tell you what Jimbo thinks marriage is: something that’s gonna cost him in money and freedom. And the guy’s too cheap on both counts to pay the price and make you happy. He’s a miser, pure and simple. Am I right, Daff?” she asked, turning her intense brown eyes on Daphne.

  Daphne bought time by sipping from her glass of ice water. Lowering the glass, she smiled. “Let me put it this way: I wouldn’t make a habit of mentioning Jim and Santa Claus in the same breath,” she conceded in a half-hearted attempt at tact.

  “To tell you the truth, I’m sick of talking about Jim,” Andrea announced. “I’ve got some real interesting news, ladies: guess who’s moving to our little corner of the world?”

  “Please,” Phyllis groaned, still caught up in the drama of her love life, “don’t make us play twenty questions.”

  “Brad Torrance,” Andrea obliged.

  “Brad Torrance?” Phyllis exclaimed, her woes abruptly forgotten. “From school?”

  “The one and only,” Andrea reported. “Eric got a call from him a couple of days ago, saying his company is transferring him to its New York City headquarters. He and Eric were really good friends in school, you know. I’m so happy for Eric.”

  “The hell with Eric,” Phyllis interjected, reflexively running her manicured fingernails through the ash blond waves
of hair framing her face. “I’m happy Brad’s going to be living nearby. He isn’t married, is he?”

  Andrea shook her head. “Not unless he’s been keeping it a secret from us. When he called with the news that he was being transferred, he used first person singular. ʻI’m moving back east,’ he said.”

  “Then there’s hope for me,” Phyllis concluded, relaxing in her chair and lifting her glass of wine. “If a hunk like Brad Torrance is still single... Who knows? Maybe I’ll give Jim his walking papers, after all.”

  “Forget it,” Andrea teased, refusing to take Phyllis too seriously. “You and Brad knew each other in college, and the sparks never ignited then. What makes you think they’d ignite now? We’re all eight years older and burnt out.”

  “Speak for yourself, Andrea,” Phyllis parried. “I’m not burnt out—I’m just entering my prime. And I bet Brad Torrance is, too. I’d love to put his prime and mine together.” She let loose with a mischievous laugh, and Andrea joined her.

  Daphne didn’t say anything. She sat quietly, twisting her fork aimlessly through the noodles on her plate, listening as her friends continued to babble about Brad Torrance and hoping her face didn’t betray her feelings. Andrea reported that Brad had phoned a week ago to tell Eric about his promotion and transfer, that he was more excited about the former than the latter, that he really didn’t want to move to the Big Apple but that this was the sort of career boost one didn’t refuse. Phyllis talked about how gorgeous Brad had been in college, how his thick, dark hair used to make her think of ranch mink, how she’d always liked guys with small buns and Brad certainly qualified as likable on those grounds. “I hope he hasn’t aged,” she concluded earnestly. “I hope he’s as handsome as he used to be.”

  He had been handsome. Daphne wouldn’t argue that. Brad Torrance had been the kind of handsome that reeked of polish and privilege, of abundant self-confidence and grace. His hair had never put Daphne in mind of mink, but then, mink wasn’t something she gave much thought to. Instead, his thick dark mane had made her think of nighttime, velvet, infinite softness, and his riveting blue eyes had made her think of endless autumn skies, and his smile had made her think of the morning sun, warm with promise, and his body, his tall, slim physique, his well-shaped hands and long legs and broad shoulders and—sure, why not?—his small buns, all made Daphne think even today, so many years later, of the astonishing stupidity she’d been capable of at one time in her life.

  Depressed by the thought, she directed her attention back to her friends’ dialogue. “So, he’s going to be staying with us while he’s house-hunting,” Andrea was saying. “His firm offered to put him up in a hotel, but when Eric invited him to camp out in our apartment, he decided that would be more fun. I’m looking forward to it myself. I’m figuring that he and Eric are going to go out and carouse every night, and I’ll be able to watch whatever I want on TV without fighting with Eric over who gets to hold the remote control.”

  “I wouldn’t mind carousing with them,” Phyllis volunteered. “But how come Brad’s going to stay with you? Maybe I’m confusing him with someone else from school, but I seem to remember that he had roots in the city.”

  Andrea nodded. “His parents live somewhere on the East Side. I guess he doesn’t want to stay with them.” She folded her hand over Daphne’s wrist, drawing her back into the conversation. “Now, here’s where you come in, Daffy. You can help him find himself a new home.”

  “No,” Daphne said much too quickly. She swallowed and forced a smile, hoping her companions hadn’t detected her tension. “There are a million real estate brokers Brad could go to,” she pointed out. “He can choose whoever he wants.”

  “He ought to want you. You’re an old friend.”

  “We were never really friends,” Daphne argued. She rarely went to such lengths to hide her feelings from Andrea and Phyllis, but this time she felt it necessary. As far as she knew, only two people were aware of what a fool she’d made of herself one ghastly night during her senior year of college: Daphne herself, and Brad Torrance. Just because Brad happened to be planning to transplant himself in New York didn’t mean Daphne was obliged to fill her friends in on the embarrassing mistake she’d made so long ago.

  “We were all friends,” Andrea declared grandly. “We were one big happy family in school. And since nobody else from that family happens to be selling real estate in the New York area these days, I think you ought to get Brad’s business.”

  The last thing Daphne wanted was Brad’s business. “I only know about housing in Jersey,” she argued. “I don’t know the first thing about what’s going on in Manhattan.”

  “Sure you do. You’re a hot-shot, Daff,” Andrea said, dismissing Daphne’s modest claim with a wave of her hand. “You know all the markets around here. But that’s irrelevant. Brad told Eric he doesn’t want to live in the city. He wants the ’burbs. And there you are, located in lovely, suburban Verona.” She smiled, inordinately pleased with herself. “This, ladies, is what they mean by networking. Old college friends become new business clients. Thank me, Daphne, for sending a potentially huge commission your way.”

  “Maybe it’ll be a small commission,” Daphne countered. “Maybe he won’t buy anything I show him. Maybe he’ll prefer Westchester.” She wondered if her friends could detect in her voice the faint hope that such a possibility might come true.

  “How many real estate brokers does he know in this area? Daff, he’s yours, and if he doesn’t realize it, I’ll whip him into shape.”

  Don’t do me any favors, Daphne muttered under her breath. But she knew the battle was lost. Andrea was constantly whipping people into shape. If Brad Torrance had the decency to reject Andrea’s advice that he begin his search for a new home by visiting Daphne’s real estate office, Andrea would harass him, cajole him, torture him—whatever it took to win his compliance.

  So Daphne had to expect him to show up at her office. They’d be forced to smile at each other and exchange small talk, and they’d feel clumsy and bashful. Neither of them would risk alluding to that hideous night eight years ago. They’d behave politely, spend an afternoon looking at houses in New Jersey, and breathe deep sighs of relief once it was over. Then they’d part ways, go home, and pray they’d never have to endure such an ordeal again.

  Or maybe it wouldn’t be an ordeal for Brad. Maybe he didn’t even remember his encounter with Daphne. Maybe it had been a mere blip on the radar screen of his life, something that had made absolutely no impression on him. “Do I remember that night?” he’d ask if she finally found the nerve to tell him why his presence made her so tense. “And what night might that be, Daffy?”

  Maybe what had been the most humiliating experience in her life hadn’t even registered in Brad Torrance’s memory.

  “Well, I don’t know about you guys,” Phyllis said, motioning toward the waiter, “but some of us have to go back to work.” Phyllis was a credit specialist at a midtown bank a few blocks away from the Indonesian restaurant. She had a prestigious, powerful position, one result of which was that she spent vast amounts of her time reading books with titles that all sounded some variation of Why Wonderful Women Fall For Deplorable Men.

  The waiter delivered the check, and, as usual, an intense debate ensued concerning about how to split it. Daphne always favored dividing the total into equal thirds, but Phyllis and Andrea refused to do that. “You never have a drink,” Andrea claimed. “It’s not fair that you should be paying for our liquor.” Daphne had convinced her friends that the only reason she never requested a cocktail or a glass of wine with her meal was that she didn’t want to return to her office in a muddled mental state. The few times she got together with her friends in the evening, she generally ordered wine and pretended to enjoy it, discreetly managing to avoid swallowing more than a sip or two. Such a charade was easier than admitting that she no longer drank liquor—and then being badgered to explain why.

  Brad Torrance could explain why, she thought grimly.
Brad Torrance could explain, from personal experience, what happened to idiotic young women who couldn’t hold their booze.

  Once the bill was settled, the three women left the restaurant together. The early April afternoon was slightly overcast and the air had a nip to it, but spring was definitely moving into the region. The daffodils and tulips Daphne had planted in the flower bed in front of her house were beginning to sprout, and she hadn’t bothered to bring a coat into the city with her.

  She and her companions strolled together as far as the bank where Phyllis worked. “Here’s an idea,” Phyllis proposed before saying goodbye. “Why don’t we have a party to welcome Brad Torrance to town? You and Eric can host it, Andrea.”

  “Thanks a heap,” Andrea grunted, although she was grinning, clearly able to figure out the motive behind Phyllis’s suggestion. “If I had this party, you’d have to bring Jimbo with you. He’d never let you go to a party without him. And if he’s there, how are you going to flirt with Brad?”

  Phyllis produced her cute pout again. Then she smiled. “All right. If I can’t go after Brad Torrance, Daffy can. How about it, Daffy? I’m giving him to you.”

  Daphne understood that, coming from Phyllis, this was an extremely generous offer. Nonetheless, she had no desire to accept it. “No, thanks,” she said as breezily as she could. “Brad Torrance was never my type.”

  “Brad Torrance was everybody’s type,” said Phyllis.

  “Daphne’s type is safe,” Andrea pointed out. “Brad Torrance was never safe.”

  “You’re right,” Daphne swiftly agreed. “So if you’re going to have this party, Andrea, do me a favor and invite some safe men. Or else count me out.”

  “Bo-ring,” Phyllis muttered.

  “Okay, ladies. I’ve gotta get back to showbiz,” Andrea said, taking a northbound turn onto Seventh Avenue. “As soon as Brad gets his bearings, I’m going to send him along to you,” she warned Daphne. “And please, Daff, sell him a house or something. I’m looking forward to seeing him, but I don’t want his search for a home in the area to turn into the endless summer.”