Going Back

by Judith Arnold

  “I know exactly what you said,” Daphne muttered. Brad’s irritation was justified, she admitted silently. He had done nothing to hurt her, either that night or this afternoon. If she was hurt, it was her own fault for overestimating her ability to remain emotionally detached after making love with him.

  Shaping a half-hearted smile, she focused on the brick wall of the office building behind him. “I don’t want you to think of me as some sort of—of outlet for you until you settle in and meet other women,” she said quietly. “I know it was good between us. But that was one special night, and I...” A deep breath. “I think we ought to leave it at that.”

  She believed she was being sound and reasonable, but something she’d said clearly struck a raw nerve in him. “Outlet?” he flared. “Is that the way you think I think of you?”

  “You know what I mean,” she said, unsure of why he’d reacted so negatively to that one word.

  He toyed with various responses. “My parents...no, never mind.”

  “How are your parents?” she asked, oddly relieved to talk about something else—anything else—with Brad.

  “I have no idea. I didn’t call them last night, either.”

  Daphne wondered what it meant for her to be lumped with Brad’s parents in his mind. Was he as exasperated by her as by them? Did he worry as much about her as he did about them?

  “Never mind,” he said, cutting her off before she could think of what to say. “Just understand, Daphne, that I never, never thought of you that way. What happened between us wasn’t just some casual search for an outlet, and you know it.”

  “Well, it sure as hell wasn’t love,” she pointed out in a taut voice. She was growing pretty exasperated, herself. Who the hell did Brad think he was to sweep into town and try for a quick roll in the hay with her? Who did he think he was kidding? He had once differentiated between relief and ecstasy for her, but she knew that even the ecstasy they’d shared in bed was a far cry from love and commitment.

  His silence, his stare, the mysterious light in his disturbingly beautiful blue eyes irked her. “Well?” she goaded him. “It wasn’t, was it?”

  “No,” he said slowly, frowning as he examined her face in the fierce afternoon sunshine. “I thought we were both clear about that.”

  She heard the subtle reproach in his words. He had probably figured out the source of her anger, and he was reminding her that she had no right to resent him. He was correct, of course. They had been clear about the fact that they didn’t love each other—except that Daphne’s feelings had backfired on her.

  She directed her rage toward herself and spared him with another half-hearted grin. “Um...I really...” She cleared the raspiness from her voice and tried again. “I really have to be going. We’ll get together some other time—for dinner,” she thought it worth stressing. “Now, you’ve got the key to your new house, right?”

  He nodded, still studying her, still frowning.

  “Do you remember how to get there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’re all set. I had the gas turned on this morning, and the electric service has been transferred into your name. The cable company’s coming in two days. I’m sorry I couldn’t get them to come any sooner—”

  “It’s fine,” he said in a strained voice. “I appreciate everything you’ve done.”

  She assumed that by everything he meant showing him the house, negotiating a good price for it and getting the utilities hooked up. Surely he didn’t appreciate getting turned down for a night of wild-and-crazy sex by a woman who obviously didn’t have anything better to do that evening, but who had stubbornly chosen solitude over his company.

  “Well.” She held his gaze for a beat longer, then awkwardly turned away and poked her key into the handle of her car door. As soon as the lock gave, Brad chivalrously opened the door for her.

  “I’ll call you once I’m settled in,” he said.

  Daphne nodded. It was the sort of thing a man told a woman, just as he told a woman she was beautiful after he’d made love to her. Much as she hated to admit it, Daphne sensed that Brad wouldn’t call her, that the next time she’d see him would be at some massive gathering organized by Andrea and Eric. Daphne and Brad would be back to where they’d been at the start—two satellites circling in separate orbits, rarely intersecting. They had neutralized their past and ended up no better off than they’d been when they’d first met each other.

  Or, perhaps, Daphne had ended up worse off, in love with someone who didn’t love her—who hadn’t loved her even during the most intense moments of their ridiculously brief affair. As he’d said, he had been clear about that.

  She was worse off, but only temporarily. She would get over this, too, in time. She’d made yet another mistake with Brad, but she would recover from it eventually. Trying to go back had been futile, and she wouldn’t go back anymore. From here on in, she vowed, she would go forward, and hopefully, the past would fade into oblivion.

  Maybe, in eight years—or eighty—it would.

  ***

  HE WATCHED HER steer her car over the parking lot’s speed bumps and out into the street. Then he slung his blazer over one shoulder, slid the envelope containing his deed and mortgage agreement under the other arm, and continued to stare in the direction of her vanished automobile. Gradually, it vanished around a curve in the road, and a muggy gust of wind cleared away the lingering scent of the car’s exhaust.

  He shook his head, but his mind wasn’t as easy to clear as the air had been.

  He ought to have been in a celebratory mood. He was now the proud owner of an exorbitantly priced dream house. He was officially back east, ready to move in and establish a new home for himself, ready to start a challenging new job. The limbo in which he’d existed for the past few months was over. He was grounded, able to start living again like a normal human being. He had an address. He belonged somewhere.

  Although he’d been looking forward to this moment for weeks, he had also been suffering from some vaguely defined apprehension. It had hovered over him when he’d left Seattle a week ago, growing stronger with each mile he driven until that afternoon, when he’d entered the lawyer’s office in a state akin to sheer dread.

  Then Daphne had appeared at the doorway to the conference room, and her presence seemed to have miraculously calmed him. Seeing her, being in the same room with a woman he considered a dear friend and soulmate, had rejuvenated him, instilling in him the profound understanding that everything was going to be all right, that he was where he belonged. He’d felt bathed in contentment.

  Closing his eyes, he relived the rush of happiness he’d experienced when she had nodded to the receptionist and then stepped across the threshold into the conference room. The shape of her dress had downplayed her already underendowed curves, making her look almost skinny, but he’d liked the way the vivid shade of it picked up the color of her eyes. He’d liked the way she had pulled back her hair with two tortoise-shell combs in an effort to tame her wild blond curls—and the way her curls defeated that effort. He’d liked the way her high heels had given her an almost statuesque grandeur, and the way her pale lips had curved into a modest smile as all the men had scrambled to their feet. As she’d stalked down the far side of the long table to reach Jay Kreitz, Brad had felt a deep sense of well-being descend over him. He’d felt as if he was finally home, safe and sound.

  Then Daphne had looked at him, and he’d felt something else, something unexpected but not at all unwelcome: lust. Throughout the entire process of finalizing the sale, he’d sat in his chair and fantasized about taking Daphne back to his room at the hotel in Fort Lee—or, better yet—to another room at another hotel, one of those places that specialized in romantic rendez-vous. He’d imagined them bouncing around on a vibrating bed, watching their reflections in an overhead mirror, calling up room service and ordering peanut-butter and strawberry-jam sandwiches and eating them in the nude.

  He wanted Daphne. He wanted to
enjoy all over again what they’d both enjoyed so much last time. What was so terribly wrong with that?

  Something, obviously. Judging by Daphne’s reaction, Brad had once again botched things royally with her. And once again, he felt awash in guilt.

  The problem was obvious: she’d fallen in love with him.

  He should have done something to reassure her, or said something that would at least have salvaged their friendship. He should have sworn to her that he loved her, too. It was the truth—even if his love was very different from the love he assumed she was feeling for him. He loved her as a friend, and he loved her as a sexual partner. Telling her that might have been enough to cheer her up.

  “Yeah, right,” he scoffed, his shoes crunching against the gravel as he trudged across the lot to his car. The State of Washington license plate affixed to the bumper looked peculiar to him, surrounded as it was by the New Jersey plates attached to all the other cars in the lot. The road dirt of Interstates 90 and 80 still clung to the metallic blue chassis, and the remains of a few dead bugs were smeared across his windshield. His car almost seemed to taunt him, indicating that as much as he wanted to belong in Verona, the lovely New Jersey town would never feel like home for him if he’d lost Daphne’s friendship.

  Telling her he loved her as a friend wouldn’t be enough. Nor would telling her he loved her as a sexual partner. She was an unusual woman, but she was a woman, and women were tricky that way. A man couldn’t simply seek sexual pleasure with them. They needed more—and they were hurt when a man was unable to provide them with all they needed.

  Not only hurt—they sometimes got downright nasty. How could Daphne have implied that Brad thought of her only as an outlet? He wasn’t like his parents, damn it. He wasn’t so crass that he was willing to settle for a simple physical experience, utterly lacking in depth. The only time he’d ever thought of sex in such unemotional terms was one icy February night during his senior year in college...

  With Daphne.

  All right. So maybe he couldn’t blame her for accusing him of using her as an outlet now. Given that precedent, she could reasonably assume that that was all she meant to him. But what about the other precedent, the more recent one? Something very real existed between them, and if it wasn’t true love, it was still valid. Brad honestly liked Daphne.

  Bewildered by the degree of loneliness he felt in the wake of her departure, he headed back to the hotel in Fort Lee to pick up his suitcase and check out of his room there. It was after seven by the time he reached his new house. His momentary alarm at seeing a couple of lights on in the house waned when he recalled that Daphne had left a few lamps on timers scattered throughout the house so it wouldn’t look abandoned.

  He was touched by the thought that, even if she was furious with him, she had lit up his house for him. She had made it homey and welcoming. Rationally, he knew the timers had turned on the lamps, but he saw no harm in pretending that Daphne herself had come to the house, glided through its rooms and switched on the lights for him. He was also touched to see that she’d hooked a “Sold” sign to the bottom of the “For Sale—Horizon Realty” sign posted at the end of the driveway. He wanted to believe that she was with him in spirit as he planted his feet on what had just become his very own property.

  Even with the lamps glowing, the house seemed barren when he let himself inside. Curtainless windows invited in the dusk light, and his footsteps echoed in the vacant rooms. The refrigerator was empty and unplugged, its doors propped open, and the sink basin was dry. A fresh wave of loneliness swept over Brad.

  Shrugging it off, he marched up the stairs to the spacious bedroom that would become his. He could have waited until his furniture was delivered the following day before checking out of the hotel. But he had spent the last seven nights in hotels, and he was ready to sleep in a real house.

  It would have been nicer to sleep at Daphne’s house. Much nicer. Or even for her to sleep with him here, on the floor, with the eaves sloping around them like a tent.

  But she would never do that. She would never sleep with him in a room that reminded her so strongly of the past.

  If she ever slept with him at all, he thought, grimacing at the possibility—the likelihood—that he would live the rest of his life without ever again making love to Daphne. He might socialize in New York, meet new women, find an ideal partner for himself, someone pretty and cultured and perfect in every way, and they would marry and live happily ever after… But always, deep within him, he would nurse an abiding sense of loss, a comprehension that he had failed Daphne.

  A comprehension that in doing so, he had failed himself as well.

  Chapter Eleven

  “MR. TORRANCE?” Cindy’s well-modulated voice reached Brad over the intercom phone. “Your parents are here to see you.”

  Leaning back in the swivel chair behind his broad desk, Brad gazed around his office. It was more spacious than the office he’d had in Seattle, as befitted his elevated position in the firm. The windows overlooked a side street, but the building across the street was only six stories high, so plenty of sunshine managed to make its way through the sealed panes of glass and into the office. The floor was covered with the same plush carpeting as the reception area, and a sofa, two arm chairs and a coffee table stood in a cozy arrangement across the room from his desk.

  The one thing he didn’t like about the office was that he couldn’t control the air conditioning. It blasted from the vents in frigid gusts. As a result, Brad had to keep his necktie and jacket on at all times.

  But the news that his parents were in the reception area warmed him—if he’d heard Cindy correctly. “Did you say parent or parents?” he asked, realizing as soon as he spoke that if only one of his parents had come, she would have announced the visitor as “your father” or “your mother.”

  In the week since he’d taken title to his house, he had spoken to each of parents several times, but he hadn’t had a chance to see either of them. He’d been overwhelmed by the basic labor of setting up his house—overseeing the delivery of his furniture, arranging it to his satisfaction, waiting for the cable and internet service to be connected, shopping for food, toilet paper, a shower curtain and other odds and ends he hadn’t thought to bring with him from Seattle.

  He’d spent his days fixing up his house and his nights feeling lonesome. His first night, his nextdoor neighbors appeared on his doorstep carrying a loaf of fresh rye bread and a small platter of cold cuts from a deli on Bloomfield Avenue. Another morning, the woman who lived across the street gave him some advice about what hours he’d be likely encounter the shortest lines at the motor vehicle department, where he’d have to go to change his car’s registration. One evening after work, Brad had called Eric and invited him out to the new house for a beer, but Eric hadn’t been available. “Now that you’re living in the area,” Eric had said, “we’re going to be able to see each other whenever we feel like it. So I don’t feel bad about having to take a raincheck on the suds.” Just that morning—Brad’s first day at work—Phyllis Dunn had tracked down his office phone number and asked him when he’d like to meet her for lunch.

  He shouldn’t be lonesome. For a newcomer to the area, he was unusually well connected. Yet there was an absence in his life, a void, an empty place that Daphne was supposed to occupy.

  Without her friendship, his new house didn’t seem like the dream home he’d thought it was. It seemed like...just a roof and four walls, a structure filled with his belongings and costing him a bundle.

  He had started to telephone Daphne several times, but each time he’d hung up before pressing the final number. He wasn’t an idiot. He knew that when a woman was in love with you, she wasn’t going to settle for being your buddy.

  He blamed himself for the situation. He’d been the one to suggest that they make love. Up to then, their friendship had been reasonably solid; she hadn’t been in love with him before that one night. He should have known the experience would have a strong
impact on her—but, then, he hadn’t known it was going to be so special, so magical. It had had a pretty strong impact on him, too. He couldn’t fault her for losing her bearings in the aftermath of all that crazy passion.

  “Mr. Torrance?” Cindy broke into his ruminations.

  “Oh. Right. My parents.” He reflexively straightened the knot of his tie, then said, “Please send them in.” He hung up the receiver and stood to receive them.

  Cindy ushered them into his office. Brad was immediately struck by how gleeful they appeared. His mother’s hair was arranged in a buoyant new style, and her eyes twinkled. His father was positively beaming. They were both dressed casually, and they were holding hands.

  Holding hands! Maybe his “dream house” was going to fall short of his dreams, after all, but this dream—Brad’s dream that his parents would rediscover their love and reconcile—seemed to be coming true. Thrilled, he bounded from behind his desk and greeted them with outstretched arms. “Mom! Dad! It’s so good to see you!”

  Penelope Torrance accepted the first hug. “Such enthusiasm,” she muttered skeptically, although she willingly returned Brad’s embrace. “I’ve tried to get you to come to the city for dinner three times now, and you kept putting me off. If it’s really so good to see me, you might have come to see me sooner. How about you, Robert? Have you had any luck getting Brad into town?”

  Robert took Brad’s outstretched hand and engulfed it in a vigorous handshake. “None whatsoever,” he reported. “I suggested that he meet me at the club, but he swore he was too busy.”

  “Too busy for his parents,” Penelope said with a sniff.

  “You’d think he actually had things worth doing in New Jersey.” Robert sneered, as usual putting a derisive twist on the words “New Jersey.”

  Brad refused to be insulted. He was too pleased to see his parents together, standing side by side and agreeing with each other. “I do have things worth doing there,” he insisted mildly. “I’m barely settled in—I’m still trying to learn my way around the neighborhood. But let’s not talk about me,” he added quickly, guiding his parents to the sofa. “Let’s talk about you.”