Mr. Right Next Door

by Arlene James

  “I think I’d better shower here, but if you’ll wait I’ll be quick.”

  She seemed surprised—and a little wary. “Oh, I don’t know...”

  “Seems to me I promised you a talk,” he prodded, adding, “Come on. After beating my socks off, it’s the least you can do.”

  One corner of her mouth quirked up in a half smile. “Okay, but...” She glanced around them at the throng of milling people.

  She was right. No place to talk here. “Never mind. I’ll meet you back at the apartment in a few minutes, okay?”

  She shrugged. “Yeah, okay. Just give me time for a quick shower.”

  He grinned. “Sorry about that bath.”

  She flipped a hand. “I can take a bath anytime.”

  He wanted to tell her that they could take a bath together later, but the words seemed impertinent at best. She wasn’t exactly showering him with affection at the moment, not that he blamed her, and the confusing feeling that it wasn’t the right time for them nagged at him. “Half an hour,” he said, and she nodded before turning and walking away.

  He rushed through a hot shower and quickly dressed, rushing out with damp hair. The wind nearly sliced his ears off, it was so cold. He knew that he’d better hurry home and get out the hair dryer before he did anything else. Once there, combing through hair that badly needed a trim, he found himself not wanting to go out again at all. Determinedly, he pushed that inclination aside, bundled himself into a coat, knit cap and gloves and hurried across the yard to Denise’s door.

  She was wearing fluffy house shoes, white knit leggings, and the big comfy sweater that she’d worn the first time he’d taken her to meet his father. She had a towel wrapped around her head and a hard brush with widely spaced bristles in one hand. He stepped up inside and pulled the door closed behind him, shutting out the cold bite of the wind.

  “Take off your coat and come into the living room where it’s warm,” she said. “I hope you don’t mind, I have to brush out my hair.”

  “Of course I don’t mind.” He took off his coat and hung it on the doorknob to the coat closet, stuffing cap and gloves into the pockets, before following her into the living room. She curled up on the armchair positioned beside the window, and he took the seat opposite her on the couch. Her cat hopped up into her lap and stretched out over the length of her thighs much as if she were a conveniently shaped pillow. “I don’t think that cat appreciates you,” Morgan said with a touch of humor.

  She wrinkled her nose. “This cat doesn’t appreciate anything. Frankly, I’m beginning to think I ought to get a dog.” She said it pointedly at Smithson, but then she scratched between his ears. The animal closed his eyes and indulged himself in a nap. Denise reached up and unwound the towel from her head. Her dark hair tumbled in shiny strands around her head and shoulders. She put the brush to her scalp and began tearing through.

  “What are you doing?” Morgan blurted, appalled.

  “Brushing the tangles out of my hair.”

  “You’re going to yank yourself bald!”

  She grimaced. “Don’t worry. I’m used to it. When your hair is this thick and long, you don’t have much choice.” She attacked it again, yanking the hard brush through it mercilessly. “Actually,” she said through her teeth, “I’ve been thinking about cutting it.”

  He couldn’t sit still for that. “Don’t you dare!” He was on his feet and moving toward her before he thought about what he intended. Reaching out for the brush, he decided not to think about it. “Give me that.”

  Surprised, she handed it over more meekly than he’d have thought possible. He walked around behind her and began gently working through the wet tangles when she sat forward. He worked for some time, thoroughly enjoying himself. It had a life of its own, this hair. He’d fantasized about this hair, and by golly he wouldn’t see it disappear, not when he could help her with it. “Cut your hair?” he said dismissively. “I like this hair.” He brushed through another long strand and laid it aside to take up one more. “In fact, I love this hair. I don’t want you to cut it.” He worked through the rest, laid aside the brush, and gathered its weight into his hands, feeling the heaviness of it, the vibrancy, the richness. “Don’t cut it. Please.”

  He heard her swallow and recognized the tremor in her voice when she said, “All right. I promise.”

  He walked around the chair and reached down for her, pulling her up and into his arms. She came easily, readily, willingly, her own arms sliding around his waist. Against the curve of his neck she whispered, “I’ve missed you.”

  He tilted her face up and cupped it with his hands. Gazing down into her eyes, he saw his own hurt and fears reflected there. “Teach me how to get through this,” he said softly. “Give me the time to work through it.”

  “Yes,” she said, and her gaze narrowed to his mouth. He laid it gently against her own, his eyelids drifting closed, and he thought, I want to marry this woman. But hard on the heels of that surprising realization came another: his father would never see him married and happy, though it had been his fondest wish to do so. A sadness so sharp that it cut pierced him. He felt an almost irrational need to bury that sadness beneath the sensuous touch of this woman, but he recognized it as the same blind need for oblivion that had kept him beneath the covers of his bed too many mornings of late, and he wouldn’t let loving Denise be that. When he made love to her, it would be in celebration and commitment, not in pain. He turned his face away, saying, “I’m sorry.”

  “Why?”

  He shook his head. “This grief, it attacks you in every vulnerable moment. I know I felt it when Mother died, but I held it at bay with the comforting knowledge that I still had Pop. I heaped my need of her on him, and now it feels doubly hard to lose him.”

  “I know. I know. I sublimated my grief over the end of my marriage in my joy of my son. I had everything invested in him, and when he died...”

  He hugged her close. “I’m so sorry. What a callous fool you must have thought me, trying to push you past the loss.”

  “No. You were right, Morgan. The living have to go on. I knew it, but I didn’t want to. You made me face it Ben made me face it.”

  “Ben?”

  She nodded. “Because he was ready to die, Morgan. He was ready. It’s a marvelous gift, that, being ready when the time comes, because it has to come for all of us. But it hasn’t come for me—or for you—and it’s not going to for a long time. I want to be ready when it does, and I think the only way to do that must be to live a life of love, a life so full that it just can’t encompass another moment. My son didn’t have that, and I felt for a long time that because he didn’t, I mustn’t. But I was wrong. That’s what Ben taught me. That’s what he was trying to tell me when he sent you out of the cabin and told me bluntly how well you can love.”

  He felt himself tremble at that, felt a coldness settle over his heart. Tears started in his eyes. He said in a broken voice, “I’m not sure that’s still true.”

  “Yes it is,” she told him flatly. “It has to be. Because I need you, Morgan. I need you so much.”

  The ice melted, leaving him aching and vulnerable but willing, at least. “I’ll try,” he whispered. “For you I’ll try.”

  She hugged him close for a long, warm moment, but then she pulled back and squared her shoulders. He’d seen that look before, and he didn’t much want to know what was behind it now, but did he really have a choice? “You can start with Christmas,” she announced.

  He recoiled from the very thought. Christmas. Snow covering his father’s fresh grave. That sadness stabbed him again. “I don’t think I can, not this year.”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, as firm as any military officer he’d ever known. “It won’t be fun. It’ll feel like a travesty, in fact, but the next one will be easier and the next and the next. The thing is not to put it off. Don’t let next year be the first. Let it be easier. Remember that we need you, Radley and I. We need you to live and to be happy again and
to love us.”

  He knew with a certain shame that he’d rather have crawled back into his lair just then, but Ben wouldn’t have wanted that. Ben had prepared him for this as best he could, and now it was up to him. And there was Radley to think of. If the world retained any shred of order, then one day Radley would have to survive the death of his own father. Perhaps he and Denise together... But he was getting ahead of himself. Christmas had to be gotten through. He took a deep breath and nodded his head.

  “All right, sweetheart,” he said. “Show me how to do Christmas.”

  Chapter Ten

  Denise and Radley really got into decorating the house, even though Morgan remained, at best, a casual observer. When she called up Radley and proposed that they help his father celebrate the holidays, he pledged himself to whatever she had in mind, and that sort of started the ball rolling. She began to envision a real Victorian Christmas, complete with a real Christmas tree and real pine boughs and real candles and real goodies baked up in the kitchen. Radley himself came up with the idea for a real Yule log. The obvious place to go out and cut down their very own tree and boughs was the homestead up on the mountain, but neither Denise nor Radley wanted to expose Morgan to that just yet, so Radley got permission from a professor at school to cut on his land up around Pea Ridge.

  It had snowed the day before they set out to get the tree and again that very morning, laying down a clean, silent, white blanket that got deeper and deeper the higher the elevation. Pea Ridge wasn’t all that high, so they decided to bundle up and go on out after the tree. Morgan goodnaturedly agreed to go along and drive the truck, but when they found what Denise proclaimed to be the perfect tree, Radley announced that he’d cut it down all by himself, and Morgan, uncharacteristically, let him. Afterward, all three tramped off in search of perfect boughs, taking one here and another there so that no tree stood denuded. It took, literally, hours, but Denise had meant to make a day of it all along. She’d packed a picnic lunch, complete with baked potatoes, a thermos of hot cocoa, and a cherry cobbler still steaming when she’d wrapped it.

  She picked a sunny spot next to a stone wall and made the guys clear away the snow in a ten-foot circle before putting down a heavy layer of rugs and unpacking the hamper. They ate like lumberjacks, especially Radley, who’d done all the heavy work. His energy recouped, he then eyed the ring of churned snow that bordered their picnic spot. Denise recognized the glint of little-boy mischief in his eyes but not quickly enough to keep from being pelted.

  All-out snow war ensued. Morgan got up and ran far enough away to keep out of the line of fire, but before they were done, he was doubled over with laughter, and that made it all worth it, even the hit to the face that shoved snow up her nose and made her teeth scream with cold. It was great fun, the kind of fun that she had denied herself for so long in order to hold on to a selfish, self-defeating grief, the kind of fun she never wanted Morgan to miss out on, even though he couldn’t join in wholeheartedly just then.

  They spent the remainder of the day and evening decorating the tree and weaving garlands. Radley put the Yule log into a brandy-and-spice bath to soak, per the instructions of his college professor, and filled the house with the exotic scent of Christmas. Over the next few days, Denise strung cranberries until her fingertips were bright red, stacked apples and cinnamon sticks in artful arrangements, did the same with oranges and mint leaves, and scoured the attics for usable decorations. She bought a truckload of ribbons and lace, fancy filigreed ornaments and slender candles. When she’d dressed the house in its Victorian holiday best, with Radley as her willing assistant, she then took over Morgan’s kitchen and threw herself into baking with wild abandon.

  Morgan was interested enough to nibble whenever he got the chance, and once she even pressed him into joining Radley at the table to decorate gingerbread men, only to come up with very un-Victorian-like football and hockey players in numbered jerseys and helmets. They laughed when she scolded them, and then she laughed, too, because they really were very cute gingerbread football and hockey players. Afterward, when Radley had left for the long drive back to Fayetteville, Morgan pulled her down into his lap and kissed the tip of her nose, saying that for a while there they had seemed like a real family, the three of them, and she was amazed by how very desperately she coveted the notion.

  The real surprise came a few days later when she proposed a dinner party. Radley, for one, was very much in favor of the idea, admitting shyly that he had been meaning for some time to introduce his father to a certain young woman of his acquaintance. Without that added inducement, Morgan more than likely would have balked at the idea, but he clearly couldn’t resist the lure of meeting Radley’s young woman. He did ask her, very seriously, to keep it small. She decided to put the leaf in his dining table and seat ten. After much discussion the guest list evolved to include an old friend of Morgan’s named Lincoln Carlton and his wife Mavis, as well as Denise’s secretary Betty and her husband Cleeve and, another surprise, Jess and Helen Faber, parents of Radley’s as yet unmet Leanne, both of whom Radley seemed to know well enough to guarantee their acceptance of the invitation.

  That evening, after Radley again insisted on driving back to Fayetteville, the reason for which being no longer unclear, Morgan couldn’t help speculating about the relationship between his son and the mysterious Leanne.

  “This is sounding pretty serious all of a sudden. Wonder how long he’s known her?”

  “Long enough to get to know her parents, apparently,” Denise said.

  “Why hasn’t he said anything about her before?”

  Disliking the tone of worry in his voice, she sought to reassure him by stating the obvious. “Radley said he’d been meaning to introduce her for some time now.”

  Morgan waved that away with a jerk of his hand. “You know young people. That could mean for the past week.”

  “Or month, or even six months.”

  He shook his head. “Why haven’t I heard about her before now then?”

  “Maybe the time was just never right, Morgan. I mean, you have been preoccupied of late. Maybe he was afraid to worry you.”

  “I’m not the worrying sort.”

  “Not until recently,” she said gently.

  He was rocked back by that. She saw a flare of anger in his eyes, but then it faded, and she watched him mull over the implications of what she’d said. After some minutes, he sighed and nodded. “Is that normal?” he asked. “I mean, after a loss, it seems to me it would be normal to start to worry about the surviving loved ones.”

  She smiled sadly at that. “I think it must be. I remember that after Jeremy died I was almost obsessed with the idea that my mother would be killed in a car accident. She was never the best of drivers. In fact, if her errands took her farther than the immediate neighborhood, she used to call me or my sister to drive her around. But we used to laugh and joke about it, you know? Then suddenly it took on a much more ominous feeling.”

  “I feel like a traitor suddenly,” Morgan admitted. “I’m the one who’s been telling everyone to get off Rad’s back and let him make his own decisions. Then he more or less announces that he has a girl, and I’m worried he’s picked a nag like his mother and will spend the rest of his life regretting it.” He winced and added, “Yikes, I can’t believe I said that.”

  “What, that Belinda’s a nag or that Radley isn’t smart enough to go for a different sort?”

  “Both.”

  Denise got up from her seat on the couch and walked over to him where he stood, leaning against the fireplace mantel. “You’re only human, after all, my darling.”

  He smiled at that. “Am I?”

  “Afraid so.”

  “Your darling, I mean.”

  She slid her arms about his waist. “More and more every day.”

  He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close. After a moment he said, “I’m sorry I haven’t been more enthusiastic about things.”

  “You’ve been fin
e,” she told him firmly, “and I know it hasn’t been easy.”

  “I keep thinking how much Pop would enjoy everything if he were here.”

  “I know.”

  “Was it like that for you?”

  “It still is,” she said. “The difference this year is that I have someone else to care about, someone to make it better for.”

  He clamped his hand in her hair at the nape of her neck and tugged her head back so that he could look down into her face. “Have I told you yet that I love you?”

  Her heart leaped to hyperspeed, but she very deliberately shook her head. “No, and I’m not sure that I want you to yet.”

  He cocked his head. “Why is that?”

  She made herself be very cool and very logical about this. “You’ve suffered—and are still suffering—a very great loss. You can’t know with absolute certainty what you’re feeling just now, and this is too important to take a chance of misreading those feelings. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. I can wait until the time is right—for both of us.”

  “Mmm, there goes that feeling again, the one you’re not sure I’m sure about.”

  She laughed. “I hope so. I really do.”

  He dipped his head and kissed her firmly on the mouth. Within moments it became a scalding exercise in frustration, wherein skin tried unabashedly to meet skin despite the barrier of clothing, and tongues tried to plumb new depths beyond the mating dance created for them. Hands tried to touch souls. Lips went for permanent bonds. The desire of the body clearly meant to ignore the sensible safeguards laid down by the mind. Morgan was the first to find the strength to push back.

  “You’d better get out of here,” he said raggedly, “before whether or not we know what we’re doing becomes a moot point.”

  She left with a smile on her face.

  It was one little irritation after another for Morgan. She wanted him to wear a tie for a dinner served in his own home, and even though he knew that normally it wouldn’t matter a fig, tonight it seemed just too much to ask. He reminded himself that she was trying her little heart out. She wanted him to have a happy holiday. He put on the tie.