One Good Turn

by Judith Arnold

  “Thinking what?”

  He looked directly, unflinchingly at her. “Thinking about how you were just a few blocks away,” he said.

  Jenny’s heart beat faster. She understood that Luke’s words had been said not to soften her up but simply because they were the truth. She was touched—more than touched. She had thought about him last night, too, thought about how pleased she was that he’d called her and how much she was looking forward to seeing him the next day, and how greatly she hoped he wouldn’t spoil their budding friendship by trying to get her into the sack. But to realize that he was thinking about her the way she was thinking about him moved her deeply.

  She wasn’t going to get a crush on him. She wasn’t going to romp with him through a crazy, meaningless two-month affair. And while she wasn’t sure exactly what his objectives were, she trusted him enough to find out.

  “I’m not looking for a summer romance, Luke,” she warned him.

  He continued to gaze steadily at her. “Neither am I,” he said.

  Simultaneously, without consciously intending to, they both lifted their wine glasses and drank.

  Chapter Three

  * * *

  THE CONCERT, LIKE the picnic, was unexpectedly refined. Seated on the steps in front of the Capitol, with an unobstructed view of the Mall and the sunset above the Potomac River, Jenny and Luke listened to the band perform not just marches but classical compositions, jazz, show tunes and a concerto for harp solo so delicate Jenny had to remind herself that the music was actually being performed by Marines.

  As enchanted as she was by the band’s artistry—and by Mother Nature’s artistry in painting the dusk sky with streaks of pink and mauve—one part of Jenny’s mind remained fixed on Luke. He sat to her left on the red-checked tablecloth, which he’d folded into a rectangle and spread across the hard stone step to cushion their seat. Several inches of space separated her hip from his, yet she could feel the heat of his body all along the left side of hers, a heat far different from the summer warmth of the evening air. She was conscious of his tawny hair brushing the collar of his shirt in back, the sharp lines of his jaw, nose and brow, the understated strength in his forearms, his bony wrists and patrician fingers, his lean, athletic legs. The subtle scent of his aftershave. The gentle radiance of his eyes. Sybil might have been able to discern the make of Luke’s shirt from across a room, but Jenny was aware only of the human being inside the shirt.

  They didn’t touch. Just the slightest movement and her elbow would bump his, her hand would find his, yet she exercised restraint. She felt as if they’d exchanged a vow that evening, a promise that they wouldn’t let their budding friendship degenerate into a meaningless sexual escapade. It was a promise she’d needed to establish, because for the first time in her life she understood what lust was all about. Luke Benning was without a doubt the sexiest man she’d ever met, and when she was with him she experienced a hunger that no amount of shrimp and stuffed celery could subdue.

  She was rather old-fashioned about sex. She’d slept with only one guy in her life, someone she’d dated for five years, throughout high school and on into college—and it was only after knowing Peter for four years that she’d finally gone to bed with him. The fifteen hundred miles separating Smith College from the University of Texas, where he was a student, ultimately led to the end of their relationship, but there had never been any question in Jenny’s mind that she and Peter had loved each other before they’d become physically intimate—and afterward, as well.

  That was how she believed things should be. Perhaps in time she would love Luke, and if so she would be thrilled to satisfy her raging curiosity about what lurked beneath his Ralph Lauren shirt and his smartly tailored trousers. But for now she considered it wise to maintain a buffer between him and herself.

  The final piece the band performed was a rousing rendition of the Marine Corps anthem which brought the audience to its feet. Once the applause died down and the band members began to pack up, Luke lifted the table cloth, folded it and placed it inside the picnic basket, which contained plenty of leftovers from their feast. He touched Jenny’s shoulder with his free hand as they descended the stairs, but she understood he was only trying to keep from losing her in the swarming crowd.

  Once they’d crossed the street to the Reflecting Pool, they stopped beneath a street lamp. “Wasn’t that glorious?” Jenny exclaimed, invigorated by the bouncy final number the band had played.

  “Yes. It was really nice,” Luke said, sounding surprised.

  “And to think they give these concerts for free!”

  “They aren’t exactly free,” he pointed out. “Your tax dollars and mine are paying for them.”

  “Well...” She refused to let him undermine her enthusiasm. “It pleases me to think that my tax dollars are being used for this instead of something stupid and wasteful.”

  Gazing down at her, he smiled. “It’s only nine o’clock,” he said, “and we’ve still got half a bottle of Chardonnay. Would you like a glass of wine?”

  Jenny nodded. The sky still held traces of waning light, and she was far from ready to say good-bye to Luke. She accompanied him to the site of their picnic, held the basket for him while he spread out the tablecloth, and then sat beside him and gazed first westward to the Washington Monument, now illuminated by white spotlights, and then eastward to the Capitol, its ornate dome and American flag also illuminated. She knew about greed and corruption in high places, about the overfed bureaucracy, the undue influence of lobbyists and PAC’s and all the rest of it. But sitting in the heart of the nation’s capital beside a shimmering pool of water, with inspiring monuments to liberty and democracy all around and the exhilarating harmonies of the band still echoing in her head, filled Jenny with reverence.

  “What an incredible place,” she murmured.

  Luke wedged the cork back into the bottle and handed Jenny one of the two glasses he’d filled. “Where, the Reflecting Pool?”

  “Washington,” she clarified. “This city. It’s so beautiful.”

  Luke eyed her warily, although a smile teased the corners of his lips. “You aren’t going to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, are you?”

  She chuckled. “I know I’m a cornball,” she admitted without apology. “But if you ask me—you didn’t, of course, but I’m going to say it anyway—if you ask me, the biggest problem with this country is that people aren’t corny enough. They’re all so busy hustling. That was your word, wasn’t it? They’re too busy hustling to stop and think about how magnificent this city is—not just this city but everything it stands for.”

  Luke stretched out his legs and leaned back, propping himself up on his elbows. “Do you want to know what goes on inside that magnificent building behind me?” he asked, angling his head toward the Capitol. “People talk too much without saying a damned thing. They cut deals. They focus on the next election instead of the next century. They worry about how to get onto a TV news show, and then, if they’re lucky enough to land a booking, they worry about how to handle the show’s host. That’s what the Capitol stands for.”

  Jenny had seen enough cynicism in her peers not to be taken aback by Luke’s claim. What did take her aback her was the strange wistfulness in his voice, as if he honestly wished things were different. “If that’s the way you feel, why on earth do you want to become a lawyer and join the hustle?” she asked.

  “Who says I want to?” he let slip, then shot her a quick, tenuous smile and looked away.

  She studied him for a moment. Refusing to meet her gaze, he gazed steadily at the Washington Monument towering above the Mall amid a circle of flags. She could exercise tact and refrain from questioning him on the little bombshell he’d just dropped, but that would be out of character. He knew she was a busybody, and he’d told her the night they’d met that he didn’t mind.

  “Why are you planning to become a lawyer if you don’t want to be one?” she asked.

  He shifted his weight onto one
elbow so he could free the other arm, which he used to lift his glass to his lips. He took a long sip of wine, then lowered the glass and continued to look at the Monument. “Things aren’t always so simple, Jenny,” he said cryptically.

  Most things seemed extremely simple to her—not advanced calculus or foreign languages, but the essential things: love, work, responsibility, hope, trust, knowing right from wrong. If a person didn’t want to become a lawyer, he shouldn’t become one. There were so many equally worthwhile professions to choose from, so much equally important work to be done. “You aren’t just doing it for the money, are you?”

  He let out a wry laugh. “You’ve already figured out I’m rich,” he answered. “Making lots of money isn’t an issue.”

  “Then why are you going to law school?”

  At last he turned to look at her. His eyes were piercing, his smile poignant. She realized she was nosing around in sensitive territory. Yet Luke could have told her to shut up; he could have scolded her for her busybody tendencies and sent her on her way. “If you really want to know...” he began, then drifted off.

  She urged him on with a solemn nod.

  He contemplated her for a moment more, then said, “I’ve got to become a lawyer because my brother’s in Alaska.”

  His brother? Alaska? Jenny frowned. “Is he in jail there? Have you got to go there and defend him or something?”

  “No, he’s not in jail. Last I heard he was working at a marina in Sitka.”

  “That must be exciting,” Jenny said, meaning it. She loved exploring marinas and fantasizing about the millionaires who owned the yachts. And Alaska seemed wonderfully exotic.

  “He’s not doing it for excitement,” Luke corrected her. “He’s doing it because he didn’t want to become a lawyer.”

  All right—maybe some things weren’t so simple. “Are those the only two choices a person has? Either you become a lawyer or you work at a marina in Sitka?”

  “In my family, it comes down to that, more or less.” He took another long sip of wine, draining his glass, and then set it down and shifted his weight back to both his elbows. “Elliott’s the firstborn. He was supposed to follow in my father’s footsteps, become the next hot-shot attorney, find his place in the loop and rub elbows with the power people. He was the oldest son. The crown was waiting for him. But...” Luke shrugged. “He abdicated. And I’m next in line.”

  Jenny would have laughed at the absurdity of Luke’s statement, except that he was apparently quite serious. “Just because you’re rich doesn’t mean you have to live like royalty,” she pointed out. “I mean, primogeniture seems a bit archaic, doesn’t it?”

  “It doesn’t matter what it seems,” Luke argued somberly. “That’s the way it is in my family. I’m the heir-apparent now that Elliott’s given up his place in line for the throne. I’m the one who has to follow in my father’s footsteps.”

  “Why? I mean, what’s to keep you from doing what your brother did, getting a job at a marina in, say, Key West?”

  Luke’s eyes narrowed, suddenly darkening with turbulent emotion. “My father loves me,” he said, his voice low and intense. “I’m not going to disappoint him.”

  This was definitely not simple. “If your father loved you,” she said gently, “he wouldn’t want you to go to law school if you didn’t want to.”

  Luke responded to her observation by growing tense. His jaw stiffened, his lips pressed tightly together, and his eyes lost a good measure of their warmth. Jenny acknowledged that she’d gone too far. Some things seemed so obvious to her—for instance, a father’s accepting a beloved child’s aspirations without quibble—that she blurted them out without considering how people might take them.

  Luke clearly didn’t take her remark well. “I’ve been presumptuous,” she said contritely. “I’m sorry, Luke.”

  “Forget it.”

  “Maybe I should skip teaching and become a family therapist,” she muttered. “I could recite all sorts of platitudes and spend my whole life making people angry with me.”

  “I’m not angry,” he insisted, giving her a crooked smile. “If you want to make a career of reciting platitudes, you ought to consider running for Congress.”

  If she’d offended him, he seemed to have recovered. She was relieved. “Tell me about Princeton,” she said. “I’ve never been there, but I’ve heard it’s a beautiful campus.”

  “It is,” Luke confirmed, his smile widening and his eyes regaining their earlier warmth. She suspected that his pleasure had less to do with Princeton than with her having changed the topic. If his father’s love truly depended on his attending law school, it was a very sad situation—and he didn’t need Jenny to point that out to him.

  She listened to his descriptions of the ivy-covered stone buildings with their sloping roofs and latticed windows, the stately shade trees and rolling lawns, the charm of the town surrounding the school. He made Princeton sound so pretty, she privately vowed that she’d visit the school someday, even if not as Luke’s guest. She barely knew him, after all; she had no idea whether their fledgling friendship would survive the summer.

  Still, it was a glorious dream: that she and Luke would continue to see each other, that they’d grow closer, that he’d forgive her for being so blunt and frank—that he’d even like her for it. That their relationship would evolve, that in time kissing him would feel right, that she would look into his eyes and see nothing but warmth, heat, love. That, come autumn, the love wouldn’t evanesce into a fond memory but would endure, and she’d go to Princeton and he’d come to Smith, and he’d chuck the idea of becoming a lawyer and find out what he really wanted to do with his life, and they’d do it together.

  Glorious but crazy. She’d only just met him. She had no reason to be mapping out a future with him.

  But optimism never hurt anybody, and Jenny was an optimist. So she continued to enjoy her fantasy.

  * * *

  “YALE, STANFORD AND Harvard, of course,” said Luke’s father, lowering his silverware in order to tick the schools off on his fingertips as he named them. “Columbia, Penn...”

  Luke stared at the top his father’s head. A significant number of silver strands laced through the black waves, but it was still as thick as an adolescent’s. He wished he could see his father’s face rather than his hair, though. He wished his father would look up, would talk to him instead of at him.

  “Duke would be acceptable, I suppose,” his father droned. “Chicago...”

  “Dad.”

  His father ignored the interruption. “As far as the second-tier schools—although heaven knows you’d go to one of them only as a last resort—there are plenty to choose from right in the New York area: N.Y.U., Fordham, St. John’s—”

  “Dad, please.” Look at me, he silently implored. Just look at me.

  James Benning lifted his fork and knife and cut into the pink slab prime rib on his plate. “You remind me of your mother,” he said, his tone implying that this wasn’t a compliment. “She’s always complaining that it’s impolite to discuss business at the dinner table. I say there’s no such thing as a bad time to discuss business. It’s July. You can’t procrastinate when it comes to applying to law school. Now Yale is your first choice, of course. I can speak to some of the law school’s trustees for you. And Roger Chase maintains close ties with Columbia—”

  “Dad.” Luke tried without success to keep his voice from revealing his impatience. His father raised his eyebrows in tacit disapproval of his son’s interruption. Luke offered an apologetic smile. “I don’t want you speaking to people about getting me into law school,” he explained. “If I can’t get into law school on my own, then maybe I don’t belong there.”

  “That’s a very noble sentiment,” his father said in a condescending tone. He cut another forkful of roast beef and popped it into his mouth. “However, much as I hate to have to remind you at this late date, the first rule of survival in this world is: use what you’ve got. What you are
very privileged to have, son, is a father with a network that runs through the best law schools in the country. If you don’t tap into that network you’re a fool.” He set down his fork and reached for his glass of wine. The gold and onyx cufflink at his wrist glinted beneath the sleeve of his jacket.

  Luke felt as if he were spinning back in time. Suddenly he was thirteen years old, sitting in the somber walnut-paneled formal dining room at the house in Larchmont. His father sat at the head of the table in the room’s one arm chair—his throne. Luke’s mother sat at the other end of the table, fair and fragile in her silk dress and pearls, with her ash-blond hair swept back into a knot at the nape of her neck, her eyelids permanently at half-mast and the pale, slender fingers of her left hand curled around her martini glass. Across from Luke sat Elliott, dark haired and broad-shouldered, being lectured by their father about his performance on the links at the country club that day, or about the importance of rising to a leadership position on the debate team or the basketball team, or about the significance of the country’s cultivating new Asian markets for American goods. Luke’s mother remained silent throughout the meal, sipping her drink, and Luke attempted futilely to contribute to the discussion. He tried to offer an opinion and his father cut him off, bore down on Elliott and said, “But you see, the zone defense detracts from individual effort.”

  Look at me, Luke silently pleaded. Look at me, Dad!

  His father never attended the soccer games Luke played. No matter how high Luke’s grades were, his father never commented on them, except to say, “That’s nice. Now Elliott, what can we do about this B in trigonometry? Should I hire a tutor for you? We’ve got to raise it to an A if you expect to get into Yale.” So many years later, Luke still felt the sting.