The Heart of the Matter

by Muriel Jensen

  He went to help Matt install his gift.

  “Isn’t this cool, Dad?” Matt said over and over. “I can’t believe she gave me such a great present!”

  “You’re one lucky kid, all right,” Jason agreed. He lifted the mattress to adjust the fitted sheet, then tucked the sides in while Matt replaced the pillowcase. “It would be nice if you called her and said thank you.”

  “Yeah!”

  Matt placed his towel and washcloth in a dresser drawer “so that no one else uses it.”

  Laura had apparently fibbed about going to the office.

  “It’s her answering machine’“ Matt said urgently to Jason, the phone held away from his ear. “What do I do?”

  They were all gathered around the kitchen table.

  “Say, this is Matt Warfield. Are you there, Laura?”

  Matt complied and waited for an answer.

  Jason was sure if she’d been there screening calls, she’d have picked up for Matt.

  “Let’s try her house,” Eric said. He was grimacing while he ate his brownie. Adam’s brownie remained whole except for one bite and sat on a napkin before him.

  “Why are you making that face?” Jason asked as Adam took the phone book from him to look up the number.

  Eric shrugged. “‘Cause—Dad, I’m sorry—these are really awful. I don’t know what they are, but they’re not brownies.” He offered it to Jason.

  Jason took a bite and recognized a curious taste remembered from one of Lucy’s health kicks. “They’re carob brownies,” Jason explained, grimacing himself and handing the last bite back. “It’s used in place of chocolate because it’s naturally sweet and has very little fat. I guess some people like it, but why are you eating it if you don’t?”

  Eric looked surprised by the question. “Because Laura made it.”

  Adam read a number to Matt. Matt dialed. Then his eyes lit up. “Hi, Laura. This is Mathew Jeremy Warfield,” he said formally.

  Adam and Eric collapsed into laughter. Jason warned them with a look, biting back a smile himself.

  Matt thanked Laura for the sheets, then proceeded to launch into his life story. Adam took the phone from him and thanked her for the brownies, told her with crossed fingers how much he and Eric loved them, then passed the phone to Eric, who asked for the recipe.

  Jason studied his besotted boys in wonder. Laura seemed to have brought out in them a level of social sophistication that astonished him.

  Then Eric handed him the phone.

  “Hi, Laura,” Jason said, remembering that she’d lied about her plans for the evening—probably to avoid him.

  “Hi,” she replied in a quiet, breathless rush. “I just got home…from the office. I went to do paperwork, but I got hungry and…” She was babbling. He liked that.

  “No need to explain,” he said magnanimously.

  “But I didn’t want you to think.”

  “Laura.” He stopped her with a quick and sudden decision that seemed to be forming even as the words tripped off his tongue. “I have to speak at a Kiwanis dinner on Saturday night,” he said. “And I need a date.”

  He saw his boys exchange grins, but ignored them.

  “I…ah…belong to the Kiwanis,” she said. “I’m going…to that dinner.”

  “I’ll pick you up,” he insisted. “Seven-thirty.”

  There was a pause. “Okay,” she said finally.

  The boys were staring at him when he hung up.

  “You’re going out on a date?” Adam asked, his tone incredulous. “Dad. Can you handle this?”

  “Of course.” He went to put the kettle on. He needed something to kill the carob taste. “I dated your mother, didn’t I?”

  “Yeah, but that was a million years ago,” Eric informed him. “Now you have to be careful about stuff. You have to be careful how you treat girls or they take you to court. And you have to have safe sex or you’ll die!”

  Jason nodded. “I’m glad you boys are aware of that. But this is a simple date. It isn’t about sex. It’s about getting acquainted. We’re going to have dinner and maybe dance.”

  “Do you know how to dance?” Adam asked.

  “Of course I know how to dance.”

  Eric leaned toward him gravely. “He’s not talking about that two-lines thing they used to do in powdered wigs and big dresses, you know. Do you know what the macarena is?”

  Jason put a hand to his eyes, wondering how their roles had become reversed. It was usually his job to caution and interrogate them.

  “This is a stodgy affair. I don’t think anyone in town can do the macarena.”

  Adam considered him worriedly. “Maybe you should talk to Uncle Barry.”

  Laura pulled on a little black dress with cap sleeves, a round neckline and a straight skirt, and had a comb and pins in her hand to put her hair up when the doorbell rang.

  It was Dixie. She held up a black jeweler’s box and burst past Laura into the small condo. “Sorry I’m late. Sammie had a clingy crisis when I tried to leave. Jerry had to peel her off me. You look—” she looked Laura up and down and smiled wistfully “—single.”

  Laura took the box from Dixie, who followed her to the hall mirror. “Thanks, Dix. I appreciate this so much. I have so little jewelry and nothing to go with this dress.”

  “That dress is sensational.” Dixie studied her reflection in the mirror. “Do you think this body will ever get to look like yours?”

  Laura fumbled with the clasp, and Dixie reached up to help her.

  “There’s nothing wrong with your body,” Laura told her for the tenth time in as many months. “You’ve gotten twenty pounds off, you’ve flattened your tummy and strengthened your glutes. You’re just rounder than I am, and I personally think that’s very attractive. And apparently so does Jerry. So be happy. You look maternal, ripe.”

  The necklace clasped, Dixie stood back to let Laura’s image fill the mirror.

  The necklace with its small circles of gold hanging at two-inch intervals along the chain was delicate and perfect—just what the simple neckline called for.

  Dixie laughed scornfully. “Ripe? I look like I should have been picked three weeks ago.”

  Laura swept her hair up and deftly applied clip and pins to anchor it. “Now, what have I told you about that attitude?”

  Dixie sighed. “That inner peace is reflected in outer beauty. I have to be happy with myself inside to look happy outside.” The lesson dutifully recited, she grinned. “But I’d be really happy if I was narrow-hipped and longlegged like you are. And those neat little boobs! It isn’t fair that you should be lean all over and still have full, perfectly shaped breasts.”

  Laura grabbed up a small black jeweled bag and knocked her lightly on the head with it. “Stop it.” Then she stood still at the sound of a buzzer. “It’s him!” she said to Dixie, suddenly agitated, nervous.

  Dixie blinked. “Of course it is. You’re going to have a wonderful time.” She took Laura’s shoulders and guided her to the intercom by the door. “Don’t panic. You look great.”

  “Don’t panic,” Laura repeated to herself. “Right.” She flipped the intercom switch. “Hello?”

  “Hi, Laura,” came the gravelly response. “It’s Jason.”

  “I’ll be right down,” she called, then released the switch.

  Dixie frowned at her. “You’re not inviting him up?”

  Laura shook her head. “No.”

  Dixie studied her knowingly. “I don’t think you have to be self-protective with Jason Warfield. He’s a very nice man.”

  Laura picked up a shawl off the back of a chair. “You’ve only known him a week, Dix.”

  Dixie denied that with a firm shake of her head. “I’ve been reading him for three years. I know him as well as I know Jerry, though not physically, of course.” Her eyes gleamed suddenly. “But I’ll bet that physically, he’s just as profound and wise. Loosen up, Laura. He’s not going to hurt you.”

  Dixie followed Laura ou
t the door into the hallway, and Laura locked the door behind her. Then she turned to find her friend seated on the top stair.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded.

  “I’ll stay up here until you’re gone,” Dixie said, “so that he doesn’t know you’re wearing borrowed jewelry.”

  Laura rolled her eyes, caught Dixie’s arm and pulled her with her down the stairs. “That’s ridiculous. If he’s so profound and wise, he won’t care that I’m wearing borrowed jewelry.”

  He didn’t. He didn’t seem to care about anything but her. Laura couldn’t remember ever having been treated as though she were the focal point of a man’s complete attention.

  Even in the memories she treasured of her father, she recalled that usually he touched her absently, and only when she came to him while he was reading the paper or on the phone. And when he did focus on her, it was usually between phone calls and meetings and never for very long. She remembered always being greedy for more and always being disappointed.

  Her last romantic relationship had been with a doctor, and it was common knowledge that no one ever had a doctor’s complete attention. He’d seemed delighted with her for about two months, then she’d overheard one of the nurses say that she’d spent a weekend with him several weeks before and went on to describe antics in a hot tub that should have caused drowning or at least a loss of consciousness—and that had been while Laura was dating him.

  She stopped.

  “You’re a very lucky young woman.” The Kiwanis president, a handsome older woman with platinum blond hair, leaned toward Laura as the crowd applauded Jason’s speech. “Not only is he gorgeous with a body any woman would lust after, but…” She sighed wistfully. “He has a sense of humor. I’d kill for a man with a sense of humor.”

  She was married, Laura knew, to a very intense investment banker.

  Laura applauded, too. “We’re just friends,” she said. “He’s taking my aerobics class.”

  The woman turned to her as though she were dense. “Then, make the transition to lovers before he gets away. His wife’s been gone for four years, and every single woman in town’s been waiting for some sign from him that he’s ready to date again. And he chose you. Don’t waste the opportunity.”

  After the program, much of the group left and the rest moved to the dance floor. The band was playing torchy big-band-era tunes, and Jason pulled Laura into his arms.

  She was braced for the moment, knowing it would be significant. But even being prepared didn’t protect her from the onslaught of sensation.

  His arms were strong, his movements competent if not flashy, and the scent of his aftershave was sharply herbal with just a trace of sweetness. She felt as though she could remain in his embrace for a lifetime.

  It was as though her body had sighed. She found a sweet spot close to his shoulder and, with her temple against his chin, settled in for the duration. And that was the only rub. For her, the duration was never long enough.

  Jason was surprised by how soft she felt in his arms. He’d seen her in stretch Lycra. He knew there wasn’t an ounce of excess flesh on her, and that her muscles were stronger than most men’s. Yet she slipped into his embrace like a cloud and for a moment felt almost as insubstantial.

  Then he applied the slightest pressure to her back, she leaned into him, and he felt her breasts against his coat, her legs moving with his as they turned on the small floor.

  Lust came to vivid life inside him. But he remembered the conversation he’d had with the boys about his readiness for this encounter. “This isn’t about sex,” he’d told them, “it’s about getting acquainted.” He had to remember that.

  Though sexuality wasn’t as dead in him as he’d thought. It had merely been unconscious. And Laura, however innocently, was reviving it.

  “Did you eat Twinkies as a kid?” he asked.

  She looked first confused then amused by the question. And he noticed absently as he perused her upturned face that she had freckles on the bridge of her nose.

  “Yes,” she replied. “Why?”

  “Did you eat hamburgers and fries through high school?”

  “Of course. Why?”

  “I’m trying to figure out,” he admitted, “at what point a junk-eating teenager looks up from a plate of onion rings and decides that health and nutrition are going to be her life’s work.”

  He tightened his grip on her and turned suddenly. A large man with exaggerated rumba moves, despite the bigband music, collided with his back, then bounced off and moved on.

  Laura felt the collision and the protective move of Jason’s shoulder over her. She stayed within its shelter an extra moment, not because she feared the intoxicated rumba enthusiast, but because in her lonely little world, his care and attention felt so remarkable.

  “Actually,” she said, choosing to be frank, “I think I was looking for something I could control. Food and exercise have a direct influence in and on your body, and it’s predictable if you’re consistent.”

  He thought about that a moment. The music stopped, and he caught her hand and led her toward open French doors and a balcony that overlooked the ocean. A breeze blew, but it was mid-August warm and felt like the stirring of bath water.

  He leaned a hip on the balcony railing and leaned back against a pillar as she looked out at the moonlight on the ocean. “That suggests there were other things in your life you couldn’t control,” he said.

  She explained briefly about her parents and their eventual divorce. “My father stopped wanting to see me, and my mother changed into someone else—bitter and angry. I wasted a lot of time wanting the old life back. When I finally realized it wasn’t going to happen, I decided to rebuild a life for myself in which I took complete control.” She sighed and smiled. “Did you know that food is one of the few things in life over which we have any control?”

  He smiled wryly. “Unless you’re me, then there is nothing in your life over which you have control.”

  She dismissed his denial with a wave of her hand. “Nonsense. Your life seems to be full of all sorts of difficult elements, and yet you seem to have all of it well in hand. Kids who seem to adore you and are very happy, friends who think a lot of you, a reading public that thinks you’re brilliant. You have everything—even if it doesn’t feel like you have control of it.”

  “Well.” With him sitting and her standing, he had to look a little way up into her eyes. “You’ve only seen the daytime me,” he said quietly, seriously. “You have to see me wandering around in the middle of the night with a glass of bourbon because I can’t sleep, because although I appear to have everything a man could want, I don’t have…”

  “Lucy,” she supplied, her own voice quiet, grave.

  He knew that wasn’t precisely it anymore. He’d mulled it over that night in the hot tub when he’d thought he was mad at her for making him think about the past, then realized he was mad at himself for not seeing the present.

  “She was beautiful, wonderful…remarkable,” he said with all the sincerity with which that truth would live with him forever. Then he sighed, accepting another truth. “But she’s gone. No matter how desperately I’ve wished her back—like your parents’ reconciliation—it isn’t going to happen. So I have to.start again.”

  She turned to sit on the railing, but he caught her arm and pulled her in between his knees instead. He looped his arms around her waist and pulled her in closer.

  She didn’t resist but rested her hands on his arms.

  “So, are you looking for a man you can control, as well?” he asked lightly. “I’m not sure how many of those you’ll find.”

  She smiled. There was a bright pool of light near the French doors, but the railing was in shadow and he could see the brightness of her eyes and the smooth ivory of her skin. Even as close to him as she was, the little black dress made the rest of her disappear into darkness.

  Though he could feel her unconscious inclination against the inside of his leg, and had to
fight that distraction to hear her reply.

  “Only in so far as he’d be faithful,” she said. “That seems to be a problem for me. I’ve had a few relationships I thought were going well only to discover they were going even better—and in other directions—for the men.”

  He couldn’t imagine a man ever holding her this close and being able to think about another woman. She seemed to fill his mind, his sensory awareness.

  “Then you didn’t want them, anyway,” he said. “They were obviously inferior.”

  “Are you sure?” The wind ruffled her bangs, and it must have ruffled his hair as well because her hand went to it. He felt the gentle smoothing gesture down to the marrow of his bones. “My experience seems to indicate that all men are unfaithful. Or, at least, most men.”

  He pulled her closer. He saw uncertainty flicker in her eyes for an instant, then she looped her arms around his neck.

  “You haven’t experienced me,” he said softly, drawing her closer still. “I’m as faithful as the day is long.”

  Laura felt just an instant’s panic. She wanted desperately for him to kiss her, but it was going to change everything. She was sure of it. This easy little friendship would change into something underlined by sex and overseen by expectation—two serious relationship busters.

  Then he stood and opened his mouth over hers, and she realized that she wasn’t as afraid it wouldn’t work between them as she was reluctant to risk the possibility that it would.

  But it was already too late. The instant he took confident and possessive control of the kiss, the cautious friendship was gone. What they shared was already something else, metamorphosing second by second as he dipped his tongue inside her mouth, crushed her to him as she responded, lifted her off the balcony floor in his embrace and finally drew his head back, obviously as shaken as she was.

  She wanted to scream, laugh, cry, run. Any one of those choices seemed appropriate, except that she couldn’t seem to move. That kiss had taken the control she’d carefully forced over a lifetime and rattled it until her teeth shook.

  “Jason!” she whispered, a pleat forming between her eyebrows. “I don’t…I can’t…oh, hell.”