When Noel went to answer the door, she was so stiff with anticipation that the muscles in her neck hurt. She opened the door and saw Toni, nicely dressed and wearing a smile that looked far from genuine. “Hi,” she said. “Are you ready to go?”
“Yeah. Just let me get my purse.” Noel dashed back to her apartment, got her things and locked up. She walked out onto the porch and stood next to Toni, looking at her expectantly. “Where are we off to?”
“I haven’t been to Sapore in a while. Is that okay?”
The restaurant was considered one of the best in town, with prices to match. “It’s more than okay, but we don’t have to go anyplace that nice.”
“I’d like to.”
They were only about ten minutes away, but it was a very long ten minutes. Neither of them spoke. Not a word. And Noel worried every step of the way. She couldn’t figure out why they were going to a nice restaurant if Toni was going to tell her off for making assumptions about her or for meddling in her private life. But if she just wanted to chat, why go out?
The table wasn’t ready, and the hostess steered them towards the bar, where Toni, without asking, ordered two Manhattans. When their drinks were delivered, Toni handed one to Noel and fixed her with one hundred percent of her attention, a trait that Noel loved even though she sometimes felt like she was under the microscope. This was one of those times.
“I’m not sure what’s going on, but I’ve obviously hurt you. I’d never do that on purpose, so tell me what happened.”
“I already told you,” Noel said, feeling like she had to physically pull her eyes away from Toni’s mesmerizing gaze to think clearly. “I know you see other women, and there’s nothing wrong with that,” she rushed to say. “That’s what we agreed to. But it upset me to see you with someone so young, especially someone who didn’t look like she was in control. I truly apologize for jumping to that conclusion.” She shrugged her shoulders and took a hesitant glance back at Toni. “That’s about it.”
Toni nodded briefly, and said, “There’s more. What aren’t you telling me?”
“Nothing,” Noel lied. She desperately wanted to tell Toni that she had developed feelings for her, but she couldn’t get over her belief that her admission would put Toni in an untenable position. It just wasn’t fair to agree to keep things light and then change your mind and expect the other person not to feel trapped. “I’d been over at Jackie’s, and Heidi and I were talking about younger women and how we hated feeling threatened by them. Then I saw you and assumed you were with the youngest woman you could be with and not go to jail…” She made a face that she hoped looked apologetic. “I let it get to me.”
The hostess came by to tell them their table was ready, and Toni lightly touched the small of Noel’s back as they moved through the room. The hostess pulled Toni’s chair out and started to move around to the other side of the table, but Toni beat her to it. She pulled Noel’s chair out and waited until she sat down to slide it across the wood floor.
As soon as Toni sat down, the hostess handed them their menus, and addressed her comments to Toni. A few seconds later their server delivered their drinks from the bar and told them about the evening’s specials, but Noel paid almost no attention to him. She desperately wanted to hear what Toni had to say.
It didn’t look like Toni had been listening, either. As soon as the server stepped away, she said, “I’m sorry that seeing me upset you. I wish you would have said something at the time, but it makes sense that you didn’t.” She took a sip of her drink and started to look over the menu.
There was an uneasiness between them that hadn’t been there since their first few tense meetings, but Noel wasn’t sure how to break it. In fact, she had almost no idea. Even though she and Toni had been remarkably intimate with one another all summer, she didn’t know her that well emotionally, a fact that saddened her.
“If you like bluefish, it’s locally caught,” Toni said. “Are you hungry?”
“Not very. My stomach’s been in knots all day.”
“Would you like me order for us?”
“I’d love it.” With relief, Noel folded her menu closed and put it on the table, glad that Toni was taking over.
Surprisingly, after their order was taken, Toni looked a little nervous. She cleared her throat several times, then said, “How do you feel about being with me in public?”
“Great. Why wouldn’t I?”
“I just had the impression…” she trailed off. “No, that’s not true. At least it wasn’t at first.” Noel must have looked confused, because Toni laughed softly and said, “I’ve never thought of you like I think of the tourists I see. But I have a reputation, even though I think it’s out of sync with how I really am.”
“I’m confused. Where are you going with this?”
“People seem to think I’m with a new woman every night, but that’s not true. That’s never been true. Yes, I do enjoy the company of a pretty woman, but it doesn’t happen all that frequently. I’m pickier than people seem to think.”
“Why do you think that is?”
“Probably because I don’t talk about my personal life that often. I let people think what they want to think. But when I meet someone I like, I worry that people will assume she’s just another pick-up.” She looked deeply into Noel’s eyes. “I never want anyone to think that about you.”
Frustrated, Noel felt her hands balling into fists, and she consciously tried to relax. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I don’t know,” Toni said, looking surprisingly stumped. “That’s kind of an odd conversation to have.”
Noel couldn’t help herself. She had to reach across the table and hold Toni’s work-scarred hand. “You started to say that things were one way at first and then they changed. What changed?”
“I thought you didn’t want people to know you were seeing me.”
“Me? Why would I not want people to know I was seeing you?” She shook her head, feeling a little dizzy. “Are we seeing each other?”
“I thought we were,” Toni said, looking shy and a little hurt.
Noel squeezed her hand. “No, no! I felt like we were seeing each other, but I thought you thought we were just having sex.”
“We have been. I keep trying to date you, but you don’t reciprocate.”
“Me? I don’t reciprocate?”
“No, you don’t. I asked you out to dinner when you first got here, I had you over to my house for dinner, and I asked you to go to Atlantic City. You’ve never asked me to go anywhere.”
“That’s not true,” Noel said, clearly agitated. “I called you and asked you out for dinner.”
“And when I couldn’t do it that night, you never asked again.”
Noel made a face and cringed. “That was so rude of me!”
“I didn’t know what to make of you. I got such conflicting messages.” Toni looked like she might cry, and she took in a few deep breaths. “I missed Max so much this summer, it was painful. She always helped me figure things out. She was such a good sounding board. Now I don’t have anyone.” She bit her bottom lip as a few tears ran down her cheeks. “It’s been so lonely without her, and I feel lost not having her advice.”
Noel let herself speak the words that came straight from her heart, not letting herself censor her feelings. “I want to skip dinner and go to your house and hold you.” She squeezed her hand so hard that Toni winced.
When Toni smiled, it was shy and very vulnerable looking. “I’d like that. I just wish you would have told me before I ordered.”
***
They were waiting for the check when the most dreaded sound seeped into the building. The fire alarm could not have come at a worse time. Toni jumped up, took her wallet out, tossed her charge card to Noel and said, “Forge my name.” Then she bent over and kissed her gently before race-walking out of the restaurant.
***
Toni called the next morning, the background noise on her cell phone making it
hard for Noel to understand her. “Hi. I just stopped to get some coffee on my way to the job. It was a long night.”
“Poor thing. You must be exhausted. How late were you up?”
“All night. It was a big warehouse fire in Georgetown and all of the neighboring companies were there. It was one of those hot, potentially toxic fires. The kind every firefighter hates.”
“People who care about firefighters hate them, too. Why was it dangerous…besides the obvious?”
“They weren’t sure what was in one part of the warehouse. There were conflicting reports and, at one point, we thought it might be flammable chemicals.”
“That must have been terrifying!”
“No, not really. We’re very well trained, so we just do our job. But I must admit it does get your heart racing. I volunteered to stay around since I knew I had too much adrenaline pumping to fall asleep.”
“You could’ve come over here.”
“Now you tell me.” Toni laughed softly, and Noel could easily imagine the faint lines that bracketed her lips when she smiled. “The next time I’m looking for fun at four a.m. I’ll head right over to The Sandpiper.”
With a deep sense of longing, Noel said, “Only for another week.”
“Aw, damn. I knew it was soon, but I didn’t realize it was that soon.”
“I wish it was still June.”
“I wish the ground was still frozen and I was just heading over to The Sandpiper to meet you for the first time. I think I could do a better job if I had another whack at it.”
“That’s such a sweet thing to say. I hate that we wasted all that time too.”
“I wish I didn’t have so much going on with this job. I’ve been there past dark every night for two weeks.”
“My brother and his wife and kids are coming down tomorrow for three days, but I’ve got the weekend free. Can we spend some time together then?”
“No,” Toni said, sounding grumpy. “I have to go to a seminar on hazardous materials in Wilmington. It sounded like a good idea when I signed up, but now I wish I could get out of it.”
“You can’t, huh?”
“No. The city wants someone to go and it’s too late for me to find a substitute.”
“Want me to make you dinner tonight?”
“I’d love that. But I’m having dinner with the guy I’m working for. He has to come over from Philadelphia and it’s easiest for him to meet for dinner.”
“Come over here if it’s not too late when you’re finished.”
“If I get a second burst of energy, I will.”
Noel felt a rush of protectiveness, and said, “No, no, don’t come over. You didn’t sleep at all last night. You go home so you can get some rest.”
“Sometimes I miss being twenty,” Toni said, yawning. “Actually, I miss it every time I have to climb up on a roof.”
Part Nine
Noel still didn’t know exactly where they stood, but she felt that some major barriers to discussing their relationship had come down. She was happy that Toni made it clear that she wanted to date her—not just have sex with her. But with so few days left in the summer, she didn’t feel that they had the time to develop any emotional attachment, if that’s even what Toni wanted. But just knowing that she was, in some way, special helped her recover bits of her faltering self-confidence. For the first time she felt they were on equal footing, and that significantly buoyed her spirits.
***
Even though Toni was too busy to spare any time to meet Andy, Amy and their kids, she called Noel to check in and make sure she was having fun with her family. That small gesture felt better than receiving a dozen roses, and Noel wished she could press the phone message the way she pressed the first flower Toni gave her.
***
Noel spent her last weekend in Rehoboth saying goodbye to the friends she’d made. School started on Tuesday, and she needed at least one day to get her apartment in order and focus on the year ahead, so she planned on leaving on Sunday. Barbara, the bed and breakfast babysitter, was going to take over Sunday morning, freeing Noel to spend her last day exactly as she wanted.
She arranged to have dinner with Gloria on Friday night and with Heidi on Saturday. Toni had to sleep at the firehouse on Friday night, but they made plans for Noel to go to Toni’s after she and Heidi finished dinner on Saturday. She was pleased that Toni rearranged some family commitments so they could spend not only Saturday evening together, but also Sunday. Noel was tempted to invite Toni to dinner with Heidi, but she still felt a little odd being with both of them at the same time. Heidi was very clearly fond of Toni, and their physical familiarity was too much to witness.
She and Heidi met fairly early, so it wasn’t even ten o’clock when she arrived at Toni’s. She knocked, but didn’t hear a sign of life. Knocking again, she started to feel a little anxious. She took out her cell phone and called Toni, her anxiety building when she could hear the phone ringing inside. On the fifth ring, Toni answered. “Hello?” Her voice was rough and heavy with sleep.
“Hi. Did you forget about me?”
“Noel?” Toni sounded like a child just woken up from a long nap. “Where are you?”
“In front of your house.” Noel smiled when she heard a significant amount of noise coming from inside. Toni threw the front door open, and Noel couldn’t help but laugh at her. She was neatly dressed, but her linen shirt and cotton shorts were a mass of wrinkles. Her hair was in place—it was so thick and straight, it was always in place. But her eyes reminded Noel of a newborn kitten’s. Unable to resist, she walked inside and kissed each sleepy eye. “I think somebody took a nap.”
“I never would have if I knew I’d fall asleep that soundly.” She went to turn on a couple of table lamps. The TV was on, tuned to the Orioles game, and the pillows and cushions from the couch had been kicked or thrown onto the floor. Given Toni’s neatness, the place was a wreck, but thirty seconds of straightening up had it in shipshape again. “Whew! I’m gonna get some iced tea to help me wake up. Would you like some?”
“We can just get together tomorrow,” Noel offered, even though she did so only to be polite.
“No, I’m fine. I intentionally let myself take a little catnap so I’d have some energy. But the game had just started when I lay down, so that’s been a while.”
Noel looked at the TV. The graphic showed the game was in the bottom of the seventh. “That’s been about three hours. The games start at five after seven, right?”
“Right,” Toni said, looking pleased that Noel was up on the team enough to know their exact starting time. She finished pouring her tea, took a few drinks, then walked over to Noel. She put the tea down and slid her arms around her waist. But for a change, she didn’t kiss her. She wrapped her tight and held her for a long time. The feeling of being encased in Toni’s embrace was one Noel knew she would have a very hard time giving up. She felt enveloped by Toni’s body, and everything—from her scent to the beat of her heart to the warmth of her body—was perfect. If they’d stayed just as they were until she had to leave for Baltimore, she would be happy.
All too soon, Toni released her. But Noel didn’t move away. She looked into Toni’s eyes and said, “I wish things hadn’t gotten so…”
“Me too. I wish I hadn’t been so busy this summer. But I’ve got to take some jobs being a site supervisor or a general if I want to build a clientele.”
“Don’t worry about that. You’ve got to work. I’m just sorry we didn’t spend more time together…standing up.”
Toni’s smile was gentle and warm. “You’ve only got yourself to blame for that. I have all these things I want to talk to you about, but when you’re standing this close to me it’s almost impossible not to start kissing you. And when I start kissing you, it’s almost impossible not to…” She playfully looked towards the bedroom, twitching an eyebrow.
“I guess there are worse problems. I’m never going to wish I had less sexual chemistry with someone. But sometime
s, with you…Whew!”
“I know,” Toni said, her handsome face reflecting her puzzlement. “I’ve never had this kind of sexual chemistry with a woman. It knocks me off my feet.”
Noel was drawn to put her arms around Toni and hug her tightly. “I love to knock you off your feet.” She kissed her tenderly, feeling the warm softness of her lips. “Sometimes you look like you’re not even sure of your name.”
“I’m not! You’ve got me completely mesmerized. That’s why I wish I hadn’t been working so much. If we could have met for dinner more often, it would have given us a couple of hours where we had to behave.”
Noel looked away, not wanting to bring up the sore subject they’d already discussed. But Toni obviously didn’t want to let it drop. “I’m very, very sorry that I didn’t ask you how you felt about people in town knowing we were seeing each other. I just assumed…” She shook her head. “I thought I knew what you were thinking.”
Noel took her by the hand and led her over to the sofa, sitting next to her instead of on her lap, which always led to an express trip to the bedroom. “Do you want to know what I was thinking?”
“Very much.”
Taking a big, deep breath, Noel said, “Okay. Here goes. At first, I was mostly interested in having sex. It’d been almost a year, and it felt fantastic to have someone I was so attracted to find me attractive. But after a few times together I started to feel like I was only someone you had sex with. I started to feel a little objectified.”
“Oh, Noel.” Toni looked like she wanted to cry. “Why didn’t you say something? I was feeling the same way. Well, not objectified, but I started wishing that you wanted to hang out with me. But you didn’t show any real interest.”
“How can you say that? If you just looked in my direction, I came like a well-trained dog.”
Susan X. Meagher - The Legacy Page 15
