“Tell me what I can do, Thomas. Tell me how I can help you.”
When he didn’t answer, Jennie leaned over and kissed him.
He did not respond to her kiss and she felt his body stiffen. She pulled away immediately.
“I’m sorry, Thomas. I…I shouldn’t have done that. It was wrong. I didn’t mean…It’s just…you know I said I loved you…and I do and…” Her eyes began to mist as she saw her dreams beginning to crumble.
“I…I’ll be leaving in the morning. It will be better for us both if I go.” She started to stand, but he caught her arm.
“No, don’t leave. I wasn’t expecting…” He smiled, sadly. “It has been years since anyone other than Emma has kissed me…It’s all right…It wasn’t wrong.”
Jennie allowed him to pull her back onto the swing. He took her hand in his and he kissed her on her cheek.
“I know you have feelings for me, Jennie. I care about you too.”
***
An hour later, Jennie rummaged through her duffle bag, searching for her medication, finally locating it inside of a tennis shoe. “Of all places,” she murmured. She was beginning to perspire, and she slipped off her sweatshirt as she walked down the hall to the bathroom carrying the three bottles. As she held a glass under the running water, she startled, hearing a voice.
“Tell me what I can do, Thomas. Tell me how I can help you. Give me strength.” Tasha stood by the door, hands on her hips, laughing.
“Were you listening to our entire conversation?” Jennie felt anger as well as embarrassment. She had meant what she had said to Thomas, but her words sounded so silly in Tasha’s sing-song voice. She took a tablet from one of the bottles and picked up the second one.
“I went downstairs for a drink of water and I heard someone on the porch. I checked to see who was outside. I had expected to find Alexis and Robbie when I cracked the door open, but I should have known it was someone else.” She smirked. “With them, it wouldn’t have been voices that I heard.”
Tasha’s eyes narrowed. “My mother has been dead for only four months and you were coming on to my father.”
“That’s not true. He was upset and I was simply…”
“You’re planning round two with Dad.”
“Thomas was upset…”
“You can call him my father, Ms. Bateman. You know he adopted Amy and me.”
“I know he adopted you, Tasha.” Jennie frowned. “Why do you insist on calling me Ms. Bateman? It sounds so…so…”
“You want me to call you Mom, don’t you? That’s your plan.” A sneer crossed her face. “You think you’re going to replace Mom, but you’re not.”
“I don’t want to replace your mother. I know it upsets you to think your father might move on, but…”
“Mom’s gone, and I expect Dad to move on, as you say. I’d be shocked if he didn’t. It would be terrible if he didn’t. But he’s not moving on with you, Ms. Bateman.”
Tasha snatched the medicine bottle from Jennie’s hand. “Are these your crazy pills?”
Jennie’s mouth dropped open. “How do you know…?”
“Oh I know a lot about you, Ms. Bateman. No one’s ever told me very much, not at one time. But, well, Alexis read the court records, and she told me a little of what she learned. I heard Dad and Mom talking a couple of times. I heard Dad and his attorney…”
“You overhear quite a bit. By accident of course.”
“Oh, yes.” Tasha nodded, her face serious. “Accidentally…But I heard a lot, and I’ve put it all together. Let’s see how well I’ve done.” She gave an evil smile. “You had a breakdown. How’s that? Better than crazy?” She paused, studying Jennie’s face. “Thought so. As a result, you abandoned Dad and my sisters. You believed in, what did you call it back then? Oh yeah, free love. You really believed in it.” She chuckled. “I also hear you had a fondness for the fruit of the vine…and its close cousins.” She looked into Jennie’s eyes “A slut and a sot? Does that pretty much sum it up?”
Jennie felt anger rising, and she balled her left hand into a fist, squeezing tightly as she had been taught.
“Please give me my medicine.” Jennie held out her other hand.
Tasha tossed the bottle into the air and caught it. “If these should fall into the toilet, how long would it take? Would you be crazy in the morning?”
“It’s not that simple, Tasha. Please…”
“I don’t buy it, you know, the crazy part. I think you simply chose a different life for a couple of years.” She glared at Jennie. “And you’ll choose it again. Maybe you never truly left it. It may be Dad missed something when they checked you out.”
She inspected the bottle in her hand. “Even if you really need the meds, you can’t take them forever, can you? Be dependent on pills like you were dependent on booze?” She gave a derisive laugh.
“You’re not good enough for Dad. You’re weak and addicted.” She shook the pill bottle, rattling the contents. “You don’t deserve him. And I’ll see to it you don’t get him.”
Her eyes slid down Jennie’s body. She smirked when she noticed her tank top and shorts. “Going back down to help Dad move on? You’re smart to lose the sweatshirt this time.” She pointed to it, lying across the sink. “My experience tells me that the more skin the guy can see, the faster he moves…on.”
She laughed, placed the bottle in Jennie’s hand, and turned toward her room.
Whitesburg
Jennie sat outside of the Royal Lion Restaurant on the square in Carrollton, sipping a Diet Coke. Her e-reader glowed on the table, but she was too distracted to concentrate. Every couple of minutes, she scanned the square, searching for Thomas.
It was noon on Saturday. Thomas would be teaching in Atlanta on Monday and Tuesday, and she had volunteered to care for Louisa. She had not told him she would skip her class on Tuesday morning, knowing he would never agree to that, but she wanted as much time as possible with the two of them. In addition, she had insisted they stay at her house, rather than in a hotel.
“There is no reason for that expense,” she had told Kara. “I’ve a perfectly good guest room, and it will keep him from having to drive into Whitesburg each morning to leave Louisa.”
“Makes sense to me.” Kara had smirked.
Jennie had crossed her arms across her chest. “What is that look?”
“Nothing, I was just thinking.”
“Thinking what?”
“You, your former husband, alone…”
“Louisa will be there.”
“Oh, right. A baby for a chaperone.” She had looked innocently into Jennie’s eyes. “Now, I know nothing really bad will happen, but others might suppose…” She had burst into laughter.
“You are terrible, you know? Do you really believe people will think we’re, uh, carrying on?”
“You know they will. The question, though, is whether you want their approval or you want to spend time with Thomas.”
Of course she wanted time with Thomas, and since she had suggested he arrive at mid-day on Saturday rather than late on Sunday, he would be with her for four nights. As for something happening, Jennie had smiled, well…
Morality is such a strange animal, she thought.
Intellectually, you might firmly believe some behavior to be inappropriate, misguided, or even evil, but emotionally…
She recalled the previous Sunday when the preacher at her church had railed against the coed dorms at the University in nearby Carrollton and the immoral behavior which, he said, inevitably accompanied such living arrangements. Jennie had found herself nodding each time he made a point.
Now she was having Thomas spend the weekend at her house, and people would speculate on whether or not he would propose the two of them sleeping together. She was wondering, though, what he would do if the proposal came from her? Morality often shifted, she knew, taking one appearance when a question was abstract, but another when an issue became personal.
But not for Tho
mas. Unless he had changed.
She shook her head, recalling the night in the hotel. No, Thomas would draw a line in the sand and refuse to step over. As a result, nothing really bad, as Kara had put it, would happen this weekend, even if they were to share a bed.
Thomas’s Lexus pulled into a parking space, and Jennie stood, waving her hand to attract his attention. Louisa was asleep, and, as he reached the table, she stood holding out her hands for the baby.
“You only spend time with me for the baby, I see. I guess I know where I stand.” Thomas pretended to pout, and Jennie laughed.
“She is rather precious,” Jennie said. “I wouldn’t take it personally.”
As she took Louisa, the baby lurched, throwing Jenny off balance and she fell against Thomas. He caught her and held her while she regained her footing. His arms felt good, and she took her time regaining her balance, lifting her head, and stealing a kiss on his cheek before moving away.
“And here I thought you were about to fall.” His eyes twinkled as he pulled out a chair for her to sit. “I was rescuing the damsel in distress and it was simply a ploy to get close to me.”
She smiled and shrugged noncommittally. “Either way, thank you for catching me.”
“Don’t take it personally. I simply didn’t want you to drop my daughter. She is rather precious.”
They both laughed.
“How was the drive?”
“It was fine. A long way, though. Have you ever thought of moving to Charleston?”
Jennie shifted the baby to her other shoulder and grinned. “Years ago…my husband and I once looked for a place to live there.”
“I remember.”
They both sat quietly for a moment.
“Are you hungry?” Jennie held out a menu. “I waited for you.”
They studied the menu, and then Thomas walked inside to place their orders. As the door closed behind him, Kara tapped Jennie on the shoulder.
“More handsome than I remembered. I can see why you invited him to stay with you.”
Jennie looked back. “Kara, you have a one-track mind. We’re just getting reacquainted and…”
They both laughed.
“He is, isn’t he? Good looking? Stick around and I’ll reintroduce you.”
Kara sat down. “Is this Louisa? She’s just beautiful.”
“She is. Looks just like her mother and—remember, I used to call her a Greek goddess?”
“I can see why.” Kara brushed a lock of hair out of Louisa’s face. “So who else knows he is here this weekend?”
“Uh,” Jennie turned away, “no one else. Just you.”
“Your mother? Your sister?”
“Just you…Look, I didn’t know how to bring the subject up. I thought I’d just wing it. That way I’d be telling one person at a time. You know that if I had told my sister, she would have told Mom. Mom would have told her neighbors, they would have called their friends…Most of them remember Thomas from when he and I were married, they’d at least recognize his name. By the time it was over, there would have been a welcoming committee at my house this afternoon.”
“You think it will be easier this way, do you? Well, let me tell you…Ms. Williams and Ms. Johnson, your Mom’s neighbors, are in the craft store on the corner. Tommy Wilson who lives down the street from you is across the street at the computer store, and the preacher at your church just parked his car next to mine.” She pointed across the square. “So you’d better practice your spiel and be ready to give it.”
Thomas returned, carrying their food. Jennie introduced Kara.
“Of course I remember Kara,” Thomas said. “How have you been?”
After a couple of minutes of small talk, Kara left them to eat their lunch. Jennie saw her glance over her shoulder and smile as Ms. Williams stepped out of the craft store and looked in Jennie’s direction.
She could almost see Ms. Williams jump when her eyes locked on Thomas. Jennie turned her head to avoid eye contact, watching her in the reflection of the window. Ms. Johnson joined her on the sidewalk, then Ms. Williams whispered in her ear, and she, too, turned to stare.
“What are you looking at?” Thomas turned and saw the two women.
“They’re friends of Mom’s. They’re watching you.”
“Me? Why?”
“Because you and Louisa are with me.”
Thomas laughed and waved, and both women quickly looked in the other direction. As they walked away, glancing over their shoulders several times as they crossed the square, Thomas took Louisa from Jennie and placed her in her car seat, strapping her in.
“She’s crawling now…”
“When did she start crawling?” The excitement in her voice surprised them both.
“Monday, and she can move like the wind. I put her on the floor after dinner. She had been sitting, leaning forward with her hands on the floor, poised to take off for about a week, so I thought nothing of it when she took that position. I turned away for five seconds, literally, and when I turned back, she was across the room.” He shook his head. “Life will get interesting from this point as I recall.”
****
An hour later, Jennie was driving toward Whitesburg, with Thomas following closely behind. She had introduced him to at least seven people while they ate lunch, and she could almost hear the buzz on the telephone lines and the ping each time a call bounced off a cell tower. Everyone who knew her will have heard by sundown.
Her hesitation to tell people Thomas was coming to visit her sprang primarily from her encounter with Tasha. She had been very clear about her opposition to any relationship between Jennie and Thomas, and Jennie feared others might feel the same way, even if there was nothing there.
Tasha’s attack had unsettled her. It had caused her to question whether chasing after Thomas—that was what she was doing, after all—was really a good idea. She wondered if Tasha had been right when she had asserted Jennie would eventually return to her other life, a slut and a sot, she had called her, and hurt Thomas again. On the other hand, she loved him and wanted a chance to make things right.
Thomas had been teasing, playful, and he allowed her to show him affection, but he seldom did more than take her hand, except when returning her occasional hugs. Of course it hadn’t been that long since he lost Emma. But then again she and Thomas had a history of their own. It wasn’t as though they had no knowledge of each other, of what to expect. He obviously felt uncertain about their relationship too, and she did not want anyone else to join in that chorus of uncertainty until she felt more secure. Jennie hoped to obtain reassurance this weekend.
She turned onto St. Paul’s Church Road and drove the winding country lane to the church, turning up the red-clay path that served as a driveway, and stopping at the foot of the front steps. Her grandmother, many of her ancestors in fact, lay in the cemetery that surrounded the church on three sides. She had purchased flowers to place on her grandmother’s grave and Thomas had agreed to stop on their way to Jennie’s house.
Jennie heard Louisa’s cries as Thomas pulled up beside her. As he took her from her car seat, Jennie held out her hands to take her.
“Poor baby. I know you’re tired. You’ve been in the car almost all day. If your daddy says it’s all right, I can put you down and you can show me how well you can crawl.” She started to bend over.
“Not in the dirt please. Certainly not on red clay.”
“Oh, right.” Jennie glanced around. “How about the grass in the cemetery. Grandmom won’t mind.”
“That’s fine. I’ll bring the flowers, if you’d like.”
They walked across the cemetery to the Bateman plot. Jennie put Louisa on the grass and she started to crawl toward the marker.
“She’ll be all right.” Thomas held out his hand to stop Jennie from chasing her. “I’ll catch her before she bumps into anything.”
Jennie removed the flowers she had left in the spring and put the new pot beside the headstone. “You never knew G
randmom,” she said to Thomas.
“No, but you talked about her quite a bit. I always thought she must have been a very good person.”
“She was. She really was. I’ve always wondered if I would have been so messed up if she had been here to help me…You know, I come out here sometimes, whenever I have a problem, and I talk to her about it.” She looked at Thomas shyly. “You think I’m crazy?”
“No. Not because of that, anyway.” He smiled. “Does it help to talk to her?”
Jennie nodded. “It does. Always. I’m not sure why, but when I’m ready to leave I know what to do…I talked to her in May about going to see you in Atlanta.”
“That was a major decision?”
“It was. We were going to be alone for the first time in…in decades. I wasn’t sure what to do, what to say. I’ve always been insecure, you know.”
“So how did it turn out? He took her hand in his.
“Really well.” She looked up at him and smiled.
“But you still feel insecure.”
Jennie nodded. “I’m afraid…”
“Louisa!” Thomas dashed across the plot and scooped her up just before she bumped her head on one of the markers. Louisa giggled. Thomas tickled her and she laughed harder.
“I have to watch you constantly.” He hugged her. “Otherwise you’ll get away, won’t you? Explore the world. Discover new places. Get into all sorts of things.”
Jennie smiled as she watched the two of them. Just the way he behaved with Alexis and Christa when they were little.
Jennie took Louisa from Thomas and they walked up the hill to the cars. .Reaching the top, Thomas turned back toward the cemetery.
“Perhaps one day Louisa will be able to talk with her mother like you talk to Grandmom.”
Jennie put her arm through his and they stood quietly for a moment, until Louisa began to squirm. “Let’s go inside.” Jennie walked up the steps of the church, turned the handle, and pushed against the door. Its hinges creaked as it swung open. She looked back at Thomas. He appeared to be waiting by his car.
“Come on. No one minds.”
Once and Future Wife Page 10
