by Gina Wilkins
Lydia frowned. “I thought you were dating. I mean, you’re together almost all the time at parties and everything.”
“We’ve dated, but it’s nothing serious,” Haley said. She didn’t know if she was trying to convince them or herself—or why she felt the need to do either at that moment. Maybe she was simply trying to save face if it turned out that Ron had already decided this complicated affair wasn’t worth the effort. “I have no claim on Ron if he wants to go out with someone else.”
“Oh. Well.”
Kristie and Lydia exchanged looks as if they didn’t know what to say. Haley was aware that Anne was studying her with a frown, but she studiously avoided her friend’s eyes.
“I guess I thought you and Ron had more of a commitment,” Lydia commented with a shrug and a quizzical smile.
Haley gave a little laugh that sounded fake even to her. “After two and a half years, you should know Ron better than that, Lydia. He doesn’t do commitment.”
Kristie blinked, then looked past Haley’s shoulder. “Oh. Speak of the devil.”
Haley whirled. How did he keep doing this?
Ron was in midstep toward her, far enough away that she wasn’t quite sure whether he was close enough to have heard anything they said. She certainly couldn’t tell by his expression, which was as relaxed and cheery as usual. Like everyone else, he had dressed for the occasion, and he looked delicious in his dark suit and white shirt. The tie he’d chosen was typically Ron—dark green festooned with a cartoon Santa Claus and flying, skipping and dancing reindeer.
“Don’t you ladies look lovely tonight,” he said in greeting, sharing an admiring smile with all of them equally.
“It’s a nice change from scrubs,” Lydia replied, her own smile coy as she glanced from Haley to Ron. “I was just standing here wishing someone would ask me to dance.”
Ron gave a little bow. “Well, far be it from me to let a pretty lady be disappointed. Shall we?”
Giggling, Lydia placed a hand on his arm. “Sure.”
Glancing over his shoulder, Ron spoke to Haley. “I’ll catch up with you later, okay?”
Oh, yes, she thought with a hard swallow. He’d heard enough to tick him off but good, despite the lazy grin he wore for the others.
She turned to Anne when the others had moved away, only to find Anne looking at her with a frown of disapproval. Because she was in no mood for a lecture—even if she probably deserved one—she turned away again. “I’d better go check with the caterer to make sure everything’s under control.”
She could almost feel Anne’s fixed frown on the back of her neck as she walked away, silently calling herself a litany of unflattering names.
Chapter Nine
The party was winding to a close when Ron led Haley to the dance floor for the first time. She had been very busy mingling and directing the festivities; he suspected she’d deliberately used her social responsibilities as an excuse to avoid a one-on-one with him.
She needn’t have worried, he thought grumpily, taking her into his arms for the slow number that was just beginning. He wouldn’t do or say anything in this public venue that would set their classmates’ tongues to wagging. Unlike Haley, herself, who hadn’t seemed to mind announcing publicly that she considered him just a temporary bedmate.
Okay, maybe she hadn’t phrased it exactly that way. But the message had been clear enough. She wasn’t looking for a future with him. Apparently all those hints from others about how hard it would be for her to get into a competitive residency program while shackled to him had made an impact on her. Or maybe she’d seen this as a temporary diversion from the start.
He hadn’t been prepared for the bolt of pain that had shot through him when he’d overheard her breezily assuring their classmates that he was free to date whomever he wanted. She’d even tried to blame it on him. He doesn’t do commitment, she’d joked.
So maybe he had avoided commitment like the plague in the past. And maybe he’d made a point of declaring that phobia to all his friends. Maybe Haley had good reason to believe he’d been amenable to a no-strings, fun-while-it-lasted fling.
Maybe he’d expected her to understand that this time it was different. With her, he’d wanted much more. He’d thought—hoped—she knew him well enough to understand that.
Apparently, he’d been wrong. And because he’d never been one to chase after a lost cause, he supposed he’d have to acknowledge that those vague, uncharacteristic daydreams he’d indulged in lately were just that. Fantasies. It was time for him to get back to reality and accept that he’d never been meant for happily-ever-after endings.
Which didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy the time he had to spend with her, he reminded himself in a silent pep talk. It just required a minor adjustment of his expectations. He could relish the time with her without getting his jaded heart broken when it ended.
Probably.
“You’re being very quiet,” Haley said tentatively, peering up at him. “Are you enjoying the party?”
He glanced around the beautifully decorated ballroom, which was getting a bit rowdy now that the guests had made a big dent in the liberally spiked punch. “It’s great. You outdid yourself tonight.”
Though she looked pleased by the compliment, she shook her head. “I certainly didn’t do it all by myself. I had lots of help.”
“I’m sure you were the primary organizer. You usually are.”
Her smile turned to a momentary frown. Had he sounded bitter? He hadn’t intended to.
“Anyway, great job, Haley. They all seem to be enjoying themselves.”
“Thank you.”
She fell silent again as he led her into a couple of tight turns with the music.
“We’ve hardly had time to talk since you started burns and I’ve been on plastics,” he said, trying to fill the uncomfortable lull. “Guess you’ll be ready for the Christmas break to rest up a little before starting next semester.”
“I know everyone’s looking forward to having a whole week off.”
He couldn’t say he was particularly anticipating the holiday. Haley would be spending time with her family and he’d be spending time alone, for the most part. He certainly didn’t want to spend any more time with his own family than necessary, considering how their interactions usually ended up.
Maybe he would use the time on his own to remind himself that he actually preferred it that way.
“I was thinking about that thing at my parents’ house next weekend,” he said on impulse. “Maybe we should just skip it, you know?”
She frowned again. “What do you mean? Why would we skip your family’s Christmas gathering?”
“I just don’t think you’d enjoy it. I mean, you’ll be spending the next two weeks on transplants, and that’s going to wear you out. You won’t want to spend your Saturday listening to my folks fuss when you could be resting and getting ready for the shelf exam.”
She shook her head firmly. “I told you that I’d go with you, and I meant it. Unless—” Looking suddenly uncertain, she asked, “Would you rather go without me? If you think my being there will make things more awkward between you and your family, I would certainly understand.”
“Actually, I was thinking of skipping out, too. I’ll be busy with vascular and it’s not like anyone there would really care if I don’t show.”
She was shaking her head before he even finished speaking. “Ron, you’ve already told your mother that we’ll be there. It would be rude to cancel at this late hour.”
He couldn’t help responding to her naive statement with a short laugh. “Rude? Sugar, my family doesn’t know the meaning of the word.”
The song ended and they broke apart. Glancing around at the classmates who were studying them not-so-subtly, apparently sensing a quarrel in the making, Haley grabbed Ron’s arm and towed him out of the ballroom through a French door that led out onto a brick lanai. Surrounded by outdoor dining tables that had been covered for the winter, she t
urned to him, her breath hanging in the chilly December air when she spoke.
“You said you were going to keep a positive attitude about this visit. Your brother and sister are making the effort. You should, too.”
He looked at her in exasperation. Her dress had only fluttery strips of fabric where there should be sleeves, so she was probably freezing. At least he was wearing a jacket. He shrugged out of it and wrapped it around her shoulders, knowing she wouldn’t drop this until they’d gotten it settled.
He spoke rationally, hoping to convince her quickly. “They aren’t making that big an effort. Deb’s probably got some agenda behind this visit. She doesn’t usually make efforts unless there’s something in it for her.”
“That’s a very cynical comment.”
He shrugged. “Let’s just say it’s based on experience.”
“Still, if you want to mend fences with your family…”
He squeezed the back of his neck, feeling the cold seeping through his thin dress shirt. “Just give it a rest, will you, Haley? Not every family is as ‘Hollywood perfect’ as yours.”
Her eyes narrowed.
He knew that expression. He’d pushed another button. He hadn’t intended to snap at her, but considering the way the evening had gone so far, he was in no mood to deal with one of her upbeat lectures about how to fix his dysfunctional family whom she’d never even met.
She planted her hands on her hips, almost dislodging his jacket. She made a quick grab for it, clutching it angrily around her. “I have never once claimed that my family is perfect,” she said, the words escaping her in irritated little breath clouds.
“You didn’t have to. I just spent a near-perfect Thanksgiving with them, didn’t I? If you think it’s going to be like that at my family gathering, I’m afraid you’re in for a big shock.”
He didn’t know exactly why he was suddenly regretting asking her to join him. Maybe he really was just trying to prepare her for the worst. Maybe he was genuinely concerned that his family would get into one of their cutting quarrels, which would especially embarrass him after that Norman Rockwell holiday he’d just spent with hers.
Maybe he worried that once she saw where he’d come from, she’d have even less interest in accompanying him to where he was going.
He knew better than to say any of that aloud, of course. He was fully aware that his ramblings didn’t exactly make sense, even to him. Which didn’t mean they didn’t have some basis in fact.
He blamed himself for the impulsive invitation on the way to her parents’ home. Had he waited until after the near-perfect Thanksgiving meal with her family, he never would have put himself into this position. Especially after hearing her declare that she didn’t consider their relationship a particularly significant one, anyway.
She took a step forward and poked him in the chest, her eyes gleaming in the multicolored Christmas lights draped from the roof and looped around nearly every available surface. “You invited me to your family’s Christmas gathering and I’m holding you to that invitation, is that clear? If I have to go just to make sure that you do, then that’s the way it will be. I’m not going to let you give up on your own family without making at least one more effort to repair your relationship with them.”
God, he adored her. Those words he would probably never say lodged painfully in his throat when he muttered, “Okay, fine. We’ll go. But don’t blame me if it’s a disaster.”
“I’ll only blame you if you don’t make an effort,” she assured him, looking satisfied that she’d railroaded him into agreeing.
“Your lips are turning blue.”
She tucked her hands into his coat pockets and nodded. “I’m ready to go back inside. Everyone’s probably wondering what we’re doing out here, anyway.”
He caught her arm when she turned toward the door, and planted a long, hard kiss on her cold lips. “Just warming you up,” he muttered when he released her. He’d certainly raised his own internal heat level.
Blinking rather dazedly up at him, she cleared her throat and turned again toward the door, looking very much like a woman who had just been thoroughly kissed. Which should stop any conjecture that they’d been out here quarreling, he thought as he followed her back inside.
They left from Haley’s apartment early the following Saturday headed for the northeast Arkansas town of Hurleyville. Haley had never been there before; Ron assured her that she hadn’t missed much. With less than eight thousand residents, the town had been dying off ever since the mill had closed back in the ’80s. Ron’s father had been laid off from that mill; since then, he’d made his living mostly working on old cars in his backyard garage.
The weather was hardly auspicious for their visit. It was unseasonably warm for early December, the sky gray and overcast. Thunderstorms with the potential to turn severe were predicted for later in the day. The threat of tornadoes in December was unusual, but not unheard of in Arkansas. Haley crossed her fingers that the weather wouldn’t take an ugly turn before she and Ron were safely back in Little Rock that evening.
Looking at the skies as they prepared to climb into the car, Ron suggested they cancel the trip because of the weather threat. She sighed at the obvious ploy and told him to get behind the wheel.
Hefting a sigh, he fastened himself into the driver’s seat. “Just don’t say I didn’t warn you. And I’m not talking about the weather now.”
They’d barely gotten out of the Little Rock city limits when she reached for her netbook to start quizzing him for the upcoming shelf exam. Ron groaned. “Already?”
She was loading the first page of sample questions. “This was the plan, remember? To use the commute time to study?”
She figured studying was a good way to avoid the uncomfortable silences that had fallen between them during the past week, ever since their confrontation outside the country club. They’d both been too busy at the hospital to get into any long conversations—or maybe they’d just used that as an excuse to avoid doing so. She knew she hadn’t wanted to talk about whatever he might have overheard her saying to Anne and Lydia and Kristie, and maybe Ron was no more eager to discuss their relationship. Whatever it was.
He had obviously withdrawn from her since that night. Because he hadn’t liked what he’d heard? Because he was annoyed with her for pushing him into this family visit? Or because he’d seized on a convenient opportunity to start drawing back from her before they got too deeply involved?
Had the visit with her family initiated the change? She couldn’t remember, exactly, though she knew that had been when she’d started to pull away. When she had realized how important he could become to her if she wasn’t careful, how crucial a part of her life he could become if she let him. Maybe that visit with her “Hollywood perfect” family, as he’d called them, had scared him, too, for reasons of his own. Reasons she was too cowardly to discuss with him, she admitted with a swallowed sigh.
“I’m tired of studying,” he admitted.
She gave a short laugh. “Yeah, well, too bad. You still have a year and a half of med school, then a minimum of four years of residency, and then career-long ongoing education. If you didn’t want to study, you should have stuck with your carnival job.”
“Nah. That was too hard work. And every time some little kid turned big, puppy-dog eyes on me, I caved and gave the kid one of the big prizes. I ended up spending more than I made.”
Even though he sounded as though he were joking, she wouldn’t have been at all surprised to learn there was some truth in that tale. Leaving the netbook open in her lap, she looked curiously at him. “You don’t talk about that time much. Those few years after you graduated high school, I mean.”
He shrugged. “I went to college. Partied too hard. Dropped out before the first semester ended rather than wait to flunk out. Tried working on cars with my dad for a while, but that was a disaster. Let my brother talk me into hitting the carnival circuit with him. Another disaster. Tried a couple of other jobs aro
und Hurleyville. Hated them. Went back to school because I couldn’t think of anything else to do. You know the rest.”
She tilted her head thoughtfully. “There was a theme in those various pursuits. Are you aware of it?”
He glanced at her with a quizzical smile. “A theme? What are you talking about?”
“You tried working with your father and your brother, and then taking jobs in your hometown. It sounds to me as if you were trying to maintain a bond with your family.”
He frowned, looking startled by the suggestion as he turned his attention back to the road ahead. “That’s not it. I was just looking for a way to support myself, and those were the first options that presented themselves to me. Like I said, they were all debacles.”
But he’d tried. And despite whatever bitterness he carried from his childhood, he still hadn’t cut off ties with his family. “Maybe things will get better in your family now that you’re all out on your own. As long as you keep trying, it’s certainly possible to have a cordial relationship with each other, even if it will never be exactly what you wish it could have been.”
He chuckled, and she braced herself for another slightly patronizing comment about her eternal optimism. It didn’t come.
Deciding not to press her luck, and hoping she’d at least given him something to think about, she turned her attention to the screen in her lap, reading the first question to him.
The drive passed quickly as they studied. They discussed the material for an hour before taking a break. Ron insisted his brain was full, and he needed time to let the material settle in. Though she laughed, Haley set the netbook aside for a few minutes.
“Tell me everyone’s names again. Your sister is Deb, right?”
“Yes. Her sons are Kenny and Bryce.”
“And she’s a single mom?”
“Divorced,” he said with a nod. “Her ex was a real piece of work. Everyone told her that he was a loser before she even married him, but that only seemed to make her more determined to stay with him. He finally ran off with another woman and she hasn’t heard a peep from him since. It’s been more than a year now.”
