He had his arm around his wife’s waist and he was smiling like he owned the world. With his wife back, Kyle supposed he did. He stopped to give Kyle a handshake. “How’s it goin’?”
“Great,” Kyle said, and made introductions.
“We’ll have to get together some time,” Chelsea said before they continued on to their table.
Getting together with other couples, being a couple. Kyle sure liked the sound of that.
“Is that one of your poker buddies?” Mindy asked.
Kyle nodded, although with everything they’d been going through lately, he was more like a comrade-in-arms.
“He’s nice. So’s his wife. It would be fun to do something with them.”
That seemed positive. Kyle took a casual drink of his beer. “So, are you saying you’d like to do more things together?”
She smiled at him. “What do you think?”
He grinned. “I think I’m glad I asked you out.”
“Me, too,” she said.
And later, when he took her home, she asked, “You want to come in for a drink. Or something?”
A drink sounded good. “Or something” sounded even better. “Yeah,” he said, “I do.”
He followed her inside and looked around the tidy little house, taking in details he’d missed the first time he was here. Being stupid. Paintings of flowers decorated the walls. She had a bowl of fruit sitting on her kitchen table. It was all homey and welcoming and he could already envision the two of them stretched out on that couch on a winter’s night, in front of the fireplace. A big orange cat regarded him warily from its perch on a rocking chair, then bolted for safety to another part of the house.
“You’ve got a cat,” he said, stating the obvious.
“That’s Snookums. She’s kind of shy.” Mindy continued on to the kitchen. “What would you like to drink?”
He joined her. She opened the fridge and bent over to inspect its contents. It was a lovely sight to behold.
“I’ve got Pepsi, lemonade, some white wine.”
“Huh?” Oh, yeah, he was supposed to be focusing on the contents of the fridge, not the woman in front of it. “Pepsi’s fine.”
She got out two cans and took glasses from the cupboard. She probably couldn’t reach the top shelf without a stepladder. Smiling, he remembered what his mom used to tell him every time he complained about his lack of height. Good things come in small packages. Mom had been right.
Mindy put ice in their glasses, poured in the pop and brought them over to where he leaned against the counter. As she smiled at him, it dawned on Kyle that, at last, he was writing his own romance.
There she stood, her eyes inviting him to kiss her. Her lips parted in anticipation. He took the glasses out of her hands and set them on the counter, saying, “Later.” Then he reached out and drew her to him.
She came willingly, a smile on her full lips.
Savoring the moment, he threaded a hand through her dark, silky hair. She was beautiful, a perfect little package.
She closed her eyes and tipped up her face, ready for his kiss.
The minute his lips touched hers, he knew his search was over and he’d found the woman of his dreams.
Oh, yeah. This was better than anything Vance could write, Kyle thought, and deepened the kiss.
It was long and juicy, and when they’d finished, she asked, “Are you sorry you’re not out with Jillian?”
“Jillian who?” he said, and kissed her again.
* * *
Jonathan and Chica had gone hiking on Lost Bride Trail. Legend had it that when you were about to get hitched, you caught a glimpse of the ghost of Joshua Cane’s bride, who mysteriously disappeared back when Icicle Falls was nothing more than a mining town. Jonathan hadn’t seen a thing.
He’d returned from his hike in a grumpy mood and heated a pizza. He should’ve been in a better mood since he’d finally lost his roommate. Adam had collected all his stuff that afternoon and was now over at Zelda’s celebrating the grand opening with his wife.
Kyle was there, too, on a date with his pal Mindy. Bernardo and Anna were out with her family. Even Vance had plans. His editor was in Seattle for a conference and they were having dinner. Juliet and Neil were going dancing at the Red Barn. It seemed like everyone was doing something tonight except him.
“We’re doing something. We’re having fun right here, aren’t we?” he said to Chica as he pulled out the pizza. Pizza and the sci-fi channel. Life was good.
If you considered that a life. Halfway through Aliens versus Aliens he decided he’d had enough. He was going out. He donned a clean T-shirt that said Nerd Is a Four-Letter Word, then left Chica in charge and headed out the door to join the gang celebrating Zelda’s grand opening.
The parking lot was full and there was a crowd inside the door waiting to be seated. There was barely room for them with all the floral arrangements and balloons saying Congratulations. No surprise that this was such a big deal. Both the restaurant and its owner, Charley, were popular.
But it was more than that. The people of Icicle Falls loved real-life Rocky Balboa stories. They supported one another, and when one of their own fought her way back from failure to success, everyone celebrated. The town itself had once been on the verge of extinction and came back strong, turning itself into a German-style alpine village. Failure happened and that was okay. Letting it beat you was not.
Jonathan passed up the restaurant, which was obviously catering to couples and families, and entered the bar, just another swinging single out for a good time.
Except once in the bar, he became acutely aware of the fact that although he was single, he was far from swinging. The bar was a mob scene. No one under the age of forty had stayed home, and the air was thick with perfume and aftershave. Jake O’Brien’s latest hit, “Baby, You’re Back,” was playing in the background, a warm-up for his band’s appearance later in the evening. There were lots of singles, but they’d been here long enough to form couples and groups.
Jonathan saw Tina Swift at a corner table, yukking it up with Priscilla Castro, who worked at the town hall, and a couple of guys from the bank. She saw him and waved, but didn’t beckon him over to join them.
Of course she wouldn’t. He wasn’t part of their circle. If this was a historical romance they would’ve been nobility or gentry. He, on the other hand, would have been a stable boy. He worked for them, kept their equipment running, but he wasn’t one of them.
Billy Williams, the popular cowboy who worked on a nearby guest ranch, was the center of a group of giggling women, being his usual hammy self. He was the court jester. Everyone loved the jester. Nobody noticed the stable boy. But then, you weren’t supposed to notice him, even if he’d acquired some muscle.
Jonathan didn’t last more than a few minutes. The crowd was too intimidating, too happy, too...connected. He didn’t belong. He got out of there.
Now he felt more morose than he had at home. Might as well go back to Chica and some cold pizza, he told himself. That was depressing.
Almost of its own will, his car turned toward the edge of town. In a few minutes he was pulling into a potholed parking lot in front of a tavern where he saw several trucks and a couple of muddy Jeeps. Its outside wall sported a painting of a Neanderthal dressed in a pair of lederhosen and bearing a club. The Man Cave.
The place was darker and seedier than Zelda’s. It wasn’t as packed, probably because it was all guys, busy with the important business of shooting pool and drinking. A country song was playing, accompanied by the clack of pool balls.
No one here was any more welcoming than they’d been at Zelda’s, but he didn’t feel so out of place. Was that because everyone here was a stable boy, too? He went to the bar and sat down.
The bartender was a beefy guy who looked a
little like the Neanderthal on the outside wall. “What can I get you?”
“I’ll take a Bud,” Jonathan said.
The bartender nodded and a moment later Jonathan had a beer to keep him company. He was halfway through it when a voice at his side said, “Hey there, computer man. What brings you to our man cave?”
He turned to see Todd Black at his elbow, dressed casually in jeans and a plain gray T-shirt. Plain gray, no catchy nerd talk on it anywhere. Jonathan felt like a dork. He crossed his arms over his shirt in an effort to hide the clever saying. “Uh, hi, Todd.”
“You out slumming?” Todd asked, surveying his kingdom.
“Just thought I’d get a drink.”
“You’re not over getting one at Zelda’s?”
Jonathan shrugged. “I checked it out. It’s a little too crowded for my taste.”
Todd nodded as if he completely understood, which, of course, he didn’t. He couldn’t. Cool guys like Todd never did. “Yeah, it’s a zoo.”
“You were there?” Jonathan asked in surprise. When? Had Todd seen him there, lost in the crowd, a geek in a foreign land?
“I was there earlier. Stopped by to say congrats to Charley.”
Probably somewhere in all those floral arrangements was one from Todd. The guy sure knew how to please women.
Todd clapped him on the back. “Enjoy yourself, my man. Make yourself at home, shoot some pool.”
With the other guys who were here without women. Maybe some of them were here to get away from their women. But as Jonathan looked around, he saw that most of the left-hand fingers had no gold glinting on them. Saturday night, and these guys were here, shooting pool. No one had a date, no one was over at Zelda’s, picking up girls. Saturday was loser night at the Man Cave. And here he was with the rest of them.
Not for long, he promised himself. Not for long.
Chapter Seventeen
With the exception of Bernardo, who complained that his wife was starving him to death, all of Jonathan’s poker guests were in a festive mood. Vance had just signed a big book contract, and Cupid had come through for both Adam and Kyle.
“I took Chels out to dinner before I came here.” Adam grinned. “It’s like when we were first dating. We can’t get enough of each other. I gotta say, that last book I read did the trick. Thanks for making me do my research,” he said to Jonathan.
“Hey, what about me? I wrote ’em,” Vance said.
“Not the one that helped me, so don’t go getting a fat head,” Adam said genially.
“Well, his books helped me,” Kyle insisted. “So did the others. In fact, I learned something different from one book I read. Plus it was fun. Who knew chick books were so cool?”
“I did,” Vance said with a grin.
“I’m taking Mindy to the street dance,” Kyle announced.
Icicle Falls celebrated the Fourth of July in a big way. On the Fourth, residents enjoyed picnics, a parade and a street fair and, at night, fireworks over the Wenatchee River. But the big kickoff was the street dance the evening before. Vendors sold everything from burgers and corn on the cob to shaved ice. All of Center Street closed down. There was always a climbing wall and bounce house and space for chalk drawing on one end and, down by the bandstand, dancing. This year, two different bands would be playing, one offering fifties and sixties classics, the other covering the eighties clear through to the latest hits. Anyone who was anyone would be there. Jonathan was not looking forward to it.
“Are you going?” Kyle asked him.
“I might, for a while.” A very short while.
“It’s a great place to make your dancing debut,” Juliet had said. “And it’ll give you confidence and help you get used to dancing in public.”
“I’m not ready,” he’d protested. He needed another six weeks, needed every day and night until the reunion. Then he’d have the whole package—new dance steps, new clothes and more new muscle.
But Juliet had insisted he climb out of his shell and attend.
“Should be fun,” Kyle said.
Yeah, for him, now that he had a woman. For Jonathan it was going to be torture.
* * *
Juliet made sure they all arrived early. The band wasn’t due to go on for another hour but already the street was packed—couples visiting with one another and eating ice cream, clumps of teens meeting up and kids darting in and out of the crowd. At the end of the street, the bounce house and climbing wall were doing a brisk business. The aroma of grilling onions and sausages danced on the air.
“I haven’t been to this in years,” Mom said as she, Jonathan, Neil and Juliet sat at a picnic table in the food court consuming hamburgers from Herman’s. “I’d forgotten how much fun it is.”
If you were coupled up. If you were single, not so much, Jonathan thought as he watched a couple en route to the bandstand stop for a kiss. What was he doing here? Oh, yeah. Making his dancing debut. His palms suddenly felt sweaty and he wiped them on his jeans. You’ll do okay, he told himself. Who was he kidding?
Kyle joined them, happy to show off Mindy. She was cute, even shorter than Kyle, with a tight little body wrapped in jeans and a tank top. She seemed nice and she looked at Kyle as if he was ten feet tall. He’d done okay.
Next Adam and Chelsea stopped by, bearing plates of burgers.
The way Chelsea’s eyes lit up when she looked at Adam made Jonathan think of sparklers. There was a happy woman. All it had taken for Adam to win her back was mastering the art of the romantic gesture.
Not for the first time, Jonathan was still racking his brain, trying to think of some romantic gesture he could make to impress Lissa. Well, he had a few weeks left.
The sounds of a guitar warming up drifted over to where they all sat and Juliet nudged him. “Hey, it’s almost time to dance.”
Whoopee.
“Are you going to save me a dance?” his mother teased.
“You can have the first one,” he said.
“Oh, I’ll take the second one,” Mom said. “We’ll let your teacher have the first. I can hardly wait to see you both in action.”
“They’re not bad,” Neil said.
Coming from Neil, that was high praise indeed.
Another ten minutes and the band had started playing “Dancing in the Street.” Juliet grinned at Jonathan. “That’s our cue. Okay, everybody, let’s get footloose.”
“All right!” Mindy hopped up, Kyle immediately behind her.
Jonathan rubbed his hands on his pant legs and pushed his glasses up his nose. He told himself to stand up. His legs didn’t get the message and his hind end stayed firmly rooted on the picnic-table bench.
“Come on,” Juliet urged, yanking at his arm. “You have to do this sometime.”
Sometime could be another time. Someplace less public.
Juliet gave another insistent tug and he reluctantly rose to his feet, feeling like he was about to take a plunge into the icy river. You’ve done that and lived, he reminded himself. And once he was in the water, he was always fine. Once he survived the first dance he’d be good.
The band had switched to something faster now, drawing a crowd...of listeners. Only two other couples were actually dancing.
Juliet dragged him through the listening throng to where the four exhibitionists were going at it. “This is perfect for swing dancing.”
He pulled back. “Let’s wait until there are more people.” He’d stick out like a clown at a funeral. Clowns. He remembered his dream and his feet went from cold to frozen. “I can’t do this.”
Juliet got right up in his face. “Do you want Lissa Castle or don’t you?”
“That has nothing to do with this.”
“Yes, it does. If you can’t dance here, you’ll never be able to dance at the re
union. Now, come on.” She gave his arm another fierce yank that about pulled it out of its socket. Who would’ve guessed his little sister was so strong?
He stumbled after her and, next thing he knew, there they stood for all the world to see.
“You can do this,” she said. “Now, go.”
It took superhuman strength to start that first move but once he had, muscle memory took over, his feet doing the steps, his arms confidently shifting Juliet back and forth. He was a passenger in his own body, watching in amazement as he went through the routine she’d taught him. The crowd made room and someone hooted encouragement.
“Flip me,” Juliet commanded.
“But...you’re pregnant,” he protested.
“Barely, and the baby’s well-cushioned in there. Come on, Jonathan.”
Why not? urged his newfound confidence. The song was almost over. They might as well go out with a bang. He obliged and, dance queen that she was, Juliet landed perfectly. The end.
The crowd went wild, invigorating him with their cheers and applause, and the lead singer up on the bandstand said, “That was some show, folks.”
Kyle slapped him on the back and Adam, who was at the front of the crowd with Chelsea, gave him a thumbs-up.
Success! He felt like he’d completed the Boston marathon. His heart was pumping like crazy and he was on such an endorphin high he was sure he’d never come down.
Neil had joined them now. “No more of that sailing through the air stuff, Jules,” he said to his wife. “You’re gonna make the baby sick.”
Romance on Mountain View Road Page 22
