Jamie looked over and nodded, "Yeah, Mother had the kitchen redone just last year. Those are polished concrete. There’s a guy in the city who’s a real artisan. He was down here for weeks making sure they were just perfect." The counters really were perfect. They were just about the same color as the floor, but they were polished to a very smooth finish. It was cool and welcoming when Ryan rested her cheek on it. "Hey, do you know what would be kinda cool on a hot day?" she asked with a little leer.
"I think I have an idea," Jamie smiled. "But I don’t think that’s what Mother had in mind for her precious counters," she added.
"You never know, Jamie. If she’s anything like her daughter...." Ryan left the thought for Jamie to finish as she cocked her head slightly.
"That’s an image I would prefer to flush from my memory bank, thank you."
"Does it bother you to think of your parents being sexual?" she inquired, genuinely interested in Jamie’s thoughts on the subject. She guessed that Jamie did not know that her father was having an affair, but she wasn’t certain. She had debated with herself long and hard before deciding not to tell her partner about seeing her father in the apartment, and she was still not 100 percent sure she had done the right thing.
"Um...I guess not. I mean, I don’t think about it a lot. Obviously I’m not around them much, but when I was younger, I got the definite idea that they enjoyed sex."
"What makes you think they enjoy sex?"
"I don’t think I noticed anything before I started to be aware of sex myself, like during puberty. Once I started being able to read the signals, I would just notice that sometimes in the mornings they’d be all sweet and tender with each other. Daddy would touch her a lot, and they’d kiss a little longer than normal before he left for work. Mother would be humming or singing a little bit while she ate breakfast. She just looked happy and satisfied," she said with a shrug.
"Do they still do that now?" Ryan asked, having reason to be skeptical about their continued ardor.
"Again, I’ve not spent a lot of time with them in the last three years, but I would have to say that the dynamic seems to have changed. Mother doesn’t get up for breakfast anymore, and Daddy seems to work a lot more than I ever remember." She looked at Ryan thoughtfully and said, "It just seems like Daddy’s married to his job more than Mother. I don’t think sex is a big deal for them anymore. Maybe it’s just because they’re getting older," she suggested.
"How old are they?" Ryan asked, now regretting pursuing the subject since she knew that Jim Evans still had a healthy, if misdirected, sexual drive.
"Mother’s 41 and Daddy will be 46 this year."
"Well, you had better still be throbbing when you’re 41, Hot Stuff," she teased.
"I’ll be hot for you when I’m 91," she promised with a grin. "I can see you now, with a big shock of pure white hair and those clear blue eyes. You’re gonna be the hottest nonagenarian around."
"With you keeping me young, I think we’ll both be pretty spry," she predicted. Her attention was diverted as her hands ran over the wooden pedestal that the concrete counter sat upon. "Hey, what do you call the finish on these cabinets?"
"That’s bleached oak," Jamie replied.
"Boy, Conor would love to take a look around this place," Ryan said appreciatively. "Oh, I forgot to leave him a note asking if he wanted to come down on Saturday."
"Call him."
"I’ll call him tomorrow. He’s probably not home from work yet, anyway," she replied as she started to fidget in her chair.
"You look like you need to get rid of some energy," Jamie said, immediately recognizing the signs.
"Well, I didn’t do anything all day," Ryan replied logically.
"You certainly did me!" Jamie laughed.
"Yeah, I guess I did, huh?" Ryan blushed just a bit at the frank appreciation that lingered in her partner’s expression. " I mean I didn’t do anything really strenuous."
"My answer still stands, Tiger. I’ve got an idea. You munch on these, and then go get some exercise while I make dinner." She indicated the cheese, fruit and bread that she had assembled.
"Okay. Should I blade or run?"
"I don’t think you should do either in this fog," she said, scrunching up her face in dismay. "Don’t you see what it’s like out?"
Ryan walked to the window, unable to even make out the courtyard in the diffuse light. "Your point?" she asked neutrally.
"You big goof! Like I’d let you RollerBlade when you can’t see the hand in front of your face. The road is about ten feet from a sheer cliff, you know!"
"Again, your point?" she asked as a smile began to curl her mouth.
Jamie shook her head and chuckled in frustration at her foolhardy lover. "Do you swim well enough to get your cardiovascular workout in the pool?"
Her face broke into a smirk as she laughed at a private joke. "Yeah, I can swim well enough," she said. "But isn’t it a little cold?"
"Nope. Finish your snack, and I’ll solve all your problems."
Ryan wolfed down the entire plateful of food, allowing Jamie one segment of an orange and a cracker. She stood and stretched and followed her lover toward the back of the house. They walked out through the butler’s pantry, past a mudroom, exiting through a Dutch door. Ryan could hear the surf pounding in the background, but it was too foggy to see a thing. They followed a steppingstone path towards a soft glow as they made their way across the lawn. As they drew near, Ryan assumed they were going to a greenhouse of some sort. The building was made entirely of glass, and she noted that it looked to be about 60 feet long but only 25 feet or so wide. Jamie opened the wide sliding doors, and Ryan was stunned to see that there was a long lap pool, a Jacuzzi and even a sauna tucked into a corner. Neither end of the building was glass, which struck Ryan as odd. "What’s on the ends?" she asked, pointing to the nearest solid wall.
"Oh, there are separate apartments on each end of the building. They each have two bedrooms, a kitchen and a small sitting room. It’s really kinda cozy. When I had Jack down here, that’s where we stayed." This revelation caused her to look a little embarrassed.
"Jamie, don’t be embarrassed to talk about your relationship with him. It’s part of you," she said understandingly.
"I’ll try," she said. "But it just feels funny to talk about sleeping with someone else. I just wish you were the only person who had touched me that way."
"Don’t think like that, Sweetie. Every experience that you have prepares you for the next one. Jack was an important part of your life. If you hadn’t had sex with him, you might not have been open to having sex with me."
"I guess that’s true," she finally agreed. Walking over to a door that led to a tiled bath and shower, she extracted a big fluffy bath sheet and placed it next to the pool. "You don’t mind swimming nude, do you?"
"Mind?" Ryan asked incredulously. "I’d never wear a suit to swim in, if I didn’t have to." She dropped her robe on a rust-colored wrought iron chaise that was covered in a buff-colored cotton duck material and jumped into the pool, being careful to tuck her legs up after she judged the water to be about four feet deep. "Wow!" she said with glee as she stretched out in the water. "This feels absolutely fantastic!"
"The water should be about 80 degrees. That’s another big fight around here. Daddy likes it at 77, and Mother likes it at 82. So they’ve finally compromised," she said with a smile. "Since we’re alone, you can change it if you want to."
"Nope. It is just perfect," she said as she turned over and started to swim. She smoothly stroked across the length of the pool, stopping at the end to execute a perfect racing turn. She came up near Jamie and popped her head out, shaking the hair out of her face as the water cascaded down her body. "This is absolute heaven," she enthused, as she tried to stay afloat.
Smiling at her friend’s pleasure, Jamie turned her thoughts to more immediate, practical concerns. "I didn’t ask you what you wanted for dinner," she said. "I could roast a chicken or grill some stea
ks, or I could make roast beef or..."
"You really did buy everything," Ryan laughed. "Chicken sounds good to me. Can you make mashed potatoes?"
"Of course I can make mashed potatoes," she said rather indignantly. "Would you mind if I did something a little creative to them?"
"Nope. I’ve yet to see you do anything creative that I didn’t like," she said with a leer.
"Umm-hmm," she nodded. "Now will you be safe out here all by yourself?"
"Yep. I’m very careful, and the water’s not very deep. How many laps to a mile?"
"Well, the pool’s 50 feet long, so..."
"So, about 105 laps," Ryan said immediately.
Jamie stared at her open mouthed. "How did you do that?" she asked incredulously.
"Do what?" Ryan asked, truly perplexed.
"How did you do that math so fast?"
"I don’t know. It just seems obvious to me. Doesn’t it to you?" she asked ingenuously.
"No, Ryan. It is not obvious to me, or to most of the rest of the world. You, my sweet, are just a little savant."
"I’ll take that as a compliment," Ryan grinned happily. "Even though I have no idea what you’re talking about," she added as she dove under the water to begin swimming her laps.
Jamie had to stay and watch her for a minute. She can swim all right, she marveled. The sleek body slicing through the water mesmerized her, barely creating a ripple as she moved effortlessly. Ryan ran through her whole repertoire of strokes, moving from crawl, to breast, to back and finally to butterfly. That was the one that Jamie loved the best. Ryan would burst through the water with a powerful surge, creating a massive explosion of sound with each stroke. As her dark head exploded from the roiling water, she shot upwards just high enough to cause her breasts to peek out before she ducked under again. She loved to watch the water sheet off of her head and shoulders as she shot upwards and slammed back into the clear blue water with a crash. Jamie finally tore herself away after she watched her finish her butterfly laps. When Ryan went back to the crawl, she left to begin dinner.
Ryan returned to the house nearly an hour later. Her cheeks were bright pink and she glowed with vitality. Her skin smelled vaguely of chlorine, but Jamie knew she had showered by the scent of her hair. As she buried her nose in Ryan’s tresses, she thought of her Mother, who always used the wildflower scented shampoo that she kept in the pool house shower. "Did you bring any other shampoo?" she asked as she pulled away.
"Yeah, I brought my usual stuff."
"Good. You smell like my Mother, and I don’t think I need that psychological scar."
"Do you want me to go wash it out now?"
"No, I’m just teasing. My Mother smells pretty good, actually. It just caught me by surprise."
"You’re really no fan of hers, are you?" Ryan asked quietly as she sat down on a kitchen stool.
"It’s…it’s not that, Ryan. I’ve spent a lot of time talking about her in therapy, as you might expect, and I’ve finally come to realize that I just don’t feel much love from her. I think that I snap off sarcastic little remarks about her because it hurts me so much to feel that she just doesn’t care for me all that much. I just wish she loved me like I love her," she muttered softly, as she turned to the sink.
This information hit Ryan like a blow to the chest. She immediately regretted bringing the subject up as she saw the look of sorrow on Jamie’s face. Rising from her chair, she crossed the kitchen and wrapped her strong arms around Jamie’s slight frame. "If she doesn’t know how to love you, it’s her issue, Jamie. You’re one of the most lovable people I know, and any emotionally healthy woman who was blessed to give birth to you would feel nothing but joy. If she doesn’t realize how special you are, I feel nothing but pity for her," she said fervently, as she squeezed the small woman in her arms.
"I’ll probably overcompensate like crazy, but I’ve vowed that if I have a child, he or she will never wonder if they’re truly loved." She sniffed as a few tears escaped.
"That will never be an issue for our children," Ryan promised as she made eye contact with her partner. "And it will never be an issue for you. I promise to show you every day how much you are loved."
"I’m completely confident about that," she agreed, as she hugged her one final time.
They broke apart, and Ryan went back to sit down, "Wow!" she said as she saw the chicken roasting on a spit in the huge stone hearth. "This is like being in the manor house, isn’t it?"
"Yeah, I guess it is," Jamie agreed.
"But I’d be the one cooking for you, Ma’am," Ryan said with a thick Irish brogue as she joked to lighten the mood.
"Oooh, I love that accent. Can you do that for me when we make love?"
"Sure," she agreed amiably. "I’ll be the little Irish scullery maid, and you can be the lady of the manor. You can take me into the butler’s pantry and make me do unspeakable acts that’ll have me in the confessional for weeks."
"My, but you have a fertile imagination," Jamie purred as she came over to slip her arms around her lover.
"You bring out my wild side," the low voice rumbled in response. They spent several minutes kissing lightly until Ryan finally asked, "What is that delicious smell?" as her nose began to twitch.
"I’m caramelizing onions," she said as she trotted over to keep an eye on her sauté pan.
"Can I help?" Ryan offered.
"Nope. Just sit there and watch me work, "Jamie ordered. "Would you like some wine?"
"Sure. That would be good."
"The wine cooler is just behind the island. Pick out something for us."
Ryan hopped off her stool and walked around the big island. She noticed as she passed that there were doors on the other side of the island, right under the prep sink. She leaned over and pulled open a door, quite surprised to find that it was a small refrigerator. Next to that door were two drawers, also food chillers, obviously for vegetables. "Pretty cool," she said, almost to herself.
She turned and opened the glass door of the wine cooler, getting down on her haunches to turn the bottles. "Do you have any suggestions?" she asked. "There’s some chardonnay, some white Bordeaux, some Ge..Ge…"
"Gewürztraminer?" her partner assisted.
"Uh…yeah, I think so," she said as she pondered the label. "German’s indecipherable for me," she admitted.
"Yeah," Jamie smirked. "This from a woman who can read Gaelic." Thinking about the wine for a minute, she chose the Gewürztraminer. "I think that’ll go well with the potatoes," she decided.
"Okay by me," Ryan said. "I know as much about wine as I do about brain surgery. No, check that. I know a lot more about brain surgery than I do about wine," she admitted.
Jamie just smiled at her, privately thinking it adorable that Ryan really wasn’t very worldly. Finally she asked, "Do you want to do our own cleaning while we’re here? My parents usually arrange for a woman to come in every morning and clean, but I didn’t know if you would be comfortable with that."
"I don’t think I want someone in here while I’m making you squeal," she said with a twinkle. "I think we can clean up our own mess."
"I thought you’d say that," Jamie said happily. "I like it when I guess right."
Ryan had opened the bottle of perfectly chilled wine and went through the glass doors into the pantry to choose wine glasses. The pantry was a marvel of efficiency. Upper and lower cabinets lined the walls, and two full sized dishwashers bracketed a deep, wide sink. A long gooseneck faucet hung from the wall, obviously so that deep items could be washed with ease. All of the glassware, cutlery and china were kept in this narrow galley. Long, wide drawers held the family sterling in felt-lined safety. There was another small, waist-high refrigerator in here, filled with olives and cocktail onions and other ingredients for mixed drinks. A large commercial icemaker hummed in the corner. Ryan looked inside and saw that it had two separate compartments, one for cubes and one for crushed ice, and she smiled at the thought of indulging her penchant for che
wing crushed ice. She finally chose two wine glasses decorated with an elaborately etched "S" and picked up the matching silver ice bucket, placing the bottle inside. Then she filled the remaining space with crushed ice and wrapped a bar towel around the neck of the bottle. She returned to the kitchen to take her place at the island and watch Jamie cook.
"Where do you want to eat?" Jamie asked.
Ryan looked around again. The island was large enough so that at least six people could sit around it and be comfortable. However, there was a more traditional eating area at the far end of the kitchen. Six barrel-style wooden chairs upholstered in deep, warm brown leather surrounded a round table. The table lay right below a wide bay window with a window seat decorated in a bright green print. The other wall hosted a large, deep fireplace stacked with split firewood. This area appealed to Ryan immensely, and she indicated her preference to Jamie.
"Why don’t you start a fire?" Jamie asked. "Do you know how?"
"Harrumph!" Ryan muttered. "What kind of scullery maid can’t start a decent fire?" she asked in her Irish accent. "My people have been lighting fires with nothing but peat for a thousand years!"
Jamie just laughed at her antics and watched her expertly place some kindling at strategic points between the logs. She stuck her head up inside the hearth to check the flue, satisfying herself that she had opened it properly. She lit one of the giant matches lying near the kindling and watched the fire slowly flicker to life, then stood watching the flames for a few minutes, thoroughly satisfied with her accomplishment.
After a bit, she walked back over to her stool and sat down to watch her partner finish dinner. Jamie was just starting to roughly mash the potatoes. She hadn’t skinned the potatoes, and when they were the consistency she wanted, she added some chopped arugula and the caramelized onions. She stirred it all together and spooned them into a serving bowl, adding a handful of the onions to the top of the dish. Ryan’s mouth watered as Jamie set the bowl in front of her. "Would you put that on the table, please?" Ryan did her bidding as the smaller woman expertly removed the chicken from the rotisserie. She placed it on a carving platter and handed it to Ryan when she returned.
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