A Kiss of a Different Color

by Bettye Griffin

  Eight very long weeks.

  Even if she could hold out that long, there was no guarantee that Jon would still be interested in her at that time. A man who looked as good as he did wouldn’t be alone for long. For all she knew, he wasn’t alone now.

  That was another reason for keeping her libido under control. Jon Lindbergh attracted women like picnics attracted ants, and she was a one-man woman. Her instinct told her he would have no problem pursuing her even if he was in a relationship with someone else, but she didn’t go for that. Miranda felt that any man worth getting involved with was worth giving her full attention to, and she wanted the same from him.

  They fell into step together as they left the studio, surrounded by other members of the class. “Don’t you park in the lot?” she asked.

  “No. I usually stop in for a beer at the bar across the street when I leave here, so I park closer to there.” He paused. “Uh, you might remember I asked you to join me for a drink last week.”

  “Yes, I remember.”

  “Well, it’s a new day, so how about it?”

  With that dark cap sitting rakishly on his head he looked irresistible, but Miranda reminded herself she had to resist. “Thanks, but no. I’d better get on home.”

  “That makes two invitations and two refusals. If you keep this up I’m liable to start thinking you don’t want to have a drink with me.”

  Miranda simply looked at him, the outer corners of her mouth turned up slightly. “Well?”

  “Come on, Legs. Don’t you drink?”

  She shrugged. “I’m not a friend of Bill W.’s, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “Okay, so you don’t belong to AA. Then it must be the color thing. You don’t want to have a drink with me because I’m white.”

  “Oh, that’s ridiculous.”

  “No, it’s not. You don’t like white people.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” she repeated. “Believe me, some of my very best friends...” She broke into uncontrolled giggles. She could hardly believe she’d just used that clichéd line.

  He joined her in laughter, and then someone called out, “Hey, Miranda. It looks like your car’s got a flat.”

  “Oh, no!” With hasty steps she walked to her Hyundai Accent. Sure enough, the left rear tire was flat against the ground.

  Jon bent to inspect the tire. “Now, that’s flat,” he surmised as he straightened up.

  “No shit,” she said crossly. She sighed. “I’ll call the auto club so they can put on the donut.”

  Mitch and Helene Linehan braked to a stop on their way out of the lot. “You guys okay? Can we help with anything?”

  “We’ve got it under control,” Jon replied, waving them on. “See you guys next week.”

  “All right, good night.” The couple drove off.

  “You know,” Jon drawled, “I could offer to change the tire for you.”

  Miranda took a deep breath. “I can’t wait to hear the last half of that sentence,” she muttered, her senses on alert.

  “But if I did that, you’d be on your way in ten minutes. If, on the other hand, you call your auto club to come and do it, it’ll be at least forty-five minutes, possibly more, and I doubt you’ll want to hang around this dark parking lot after nine o’clock at night waiting for a tow truck.” He held out his arm. “Shall we go have that drink now?”

  “This is blackmail,” she protested.

  He had the decency to look distressed. “Let’s not call it that.”

  “But it is, Jon.”

  “All right, but let’s not call it that.” He raised his arm, bent at the elbow.

  Reluctantly, Miranda slipped her arm through his, and they walked across the street to the sports bar.

  They had taken seats on stools at a high-sitting table and placed an order, beer for Jon and a white wine spritzer for Miranda. She pulled out her cell phone and called to arrange for her tire to be changed. She was wrapping up the arrangements when an attractive young woman of Asian heritage approached and placed her petite hand on Jon’s shoulder. He seemed glad to see her, and Miranda found herself closely watching their interaction, even missing a cue from the customer service rep at one point.

  “Jae! What a surprise!” Jon craned his neck. “Brian here?”

  “Of course. Who else would I be out with?” she replied, her English clear and unaccented. “He worked late tonight and asked me to meet him for dinner. Why don’t you and your friend come over and join us?”

  “Well, actually...”

  “Say no more. I understand.” The woman smiled warmly at Miranda, who had just ended her call, then held out her hand. “Hi, I’m Jae Gallagher. I work with Jon.”

  Miranda reached out and shook her hand. The woman’s friendly manner put her at immediate ease. “Nice to meet you, Jae. I’m Miranda Rhett. I, uh,” she began, then realized that Jon might not want his coworker to know about his dance lessons.

  “Miranda’s my dance partner.” The brevity of Jon’s explanation told Miranda that Jae already knew about his classes. “She’s new in town, too.”

  “Oh! Well, speaking as a North Dakota resident of eleven whole months, welcome to Bismarck, Miranda.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I hope you’ll consider joining the bowling league my husband and I participate in,” Jae said.

  “Actually, Jon mentioned it earlier.”

  “They’re looking to expand the league. It starts this Thursday and runs all the way through early May. Do you bowl?”

  “Not lately,” Miranda replied with a shrug.

  “Well, you don’t have to be champion caliber to participate, although the better you do, the more money you’ll get at the end of the season. But we have a lot of fun, and I hope you’ll join us.”

  Miranda, not wanting to say one way or another, replied with a noncommittal smile.

  Jon addressed Jae. “You can count me in, and I’ll do my level best to get Miranda to come, too. She seemed a little reluctant when I mentioned it to her earlier tonight, but I’m told I can be very persuasive.”

  Miranda playfully rolled her eyes.

  “She seems nice,” Miranda remarked after Jae had returned to her table.

  “She is. She and her husband practically adopted me after I got into town. They had me over for dinner a couple of times, introduced me to some people. They’re from San Francisco and wanted to live someplace more affordable. He works in purchasing at St. Alexius, and she’s an accountant. Like us, neither of them have any family here.”

  “Do they have children?”

  “No, not yet.” He looked at her curiously. “Have you ever been married, Miranda?”

  “No. You?”

  “Haven’t met the right woman.”

  She found that response amusing. “And I’m sure you’re looking for her everywhere.”

  “I wouldn’t say that. I’m not sure such a creature even exists. Or that she’d want me if she does.”

  Hmph. Fat chance of that happening. All she has to do is see how good you look, hear how good you sound, smell that hint of cologne you always wear, touch that strong back of yours. Miranda had done all four, but there was one more of the senses she hadn’t experienced with regard to Jon...taste. She allowed herself a quick glimpse at his lips, which were full enough to be visible under his mustache. Just thinking about running her tongue across his lips and slipping her tongue inside his mouth made her feel lightheaded. Aloud she calmly said, “Oh, I’m sure there was probably a female or two who was secretly hoping she could keep you still long enough to get a proposal out of you. But somehow you don’t strike me as a one-man woman.”

  “I’m completely monogamous when I’m in a relationship,” he said defensively.

  The corners of her mouth turned upward. “Why do I know there’s a ‘but’ coming?”

  Jon’s indignation gave way to earnestness. “Okay,” he admitted. “I confess...most of my relationships only last a season or two. You know, spring and summ
er with someone, fall and winter with somebody else. Right now it’s open season.”

  Miranda’s mouth momentarily fell open. “And do the women agree to this temporary hookup ahead of time?”

  “Why not? That way a relationship never gets stale and boring.”

  “So, it just…ends on the dot of the solstice?” That sounded about as romantic as a scheduled execution.

  “Sometimes a little earlier, sometimes a little later. Things usually start to unravel after a couple of months anyway.”

  “I still can’t believe any woman would agree to such a thing.”

  He shrugged. “When I turn on my charm I’m hard to resist.”

  She was finding him hard to resist now, and she secretly envied Miss Autumn, whoever she would ultimately be…and her money said it would be the blonde from last week. Aloud she said, “Well, you’d better hurry up and get hooked up for the fall. It’ll soon be October, and they tell me winter comes early in Bismarck. I distinctly feel it now,” she added with a mock shiver.

  “Tell me about it.” He fell silent, looking at her intently.

  What was he thinking, Miranda wondered as she swallowed nervously. “If I’m not being too nosy, why would you want such a short-term duration in the first place?”

  He shrugged. “There doesn’t seem to be much point in anything longer. My great grandparents’ marriage broke up. My grandparents’ marriage broke up, and my grandmother struggled to raise my mother alone. My parents’ marriage broke up, and my mother struggled to raise me and my sister. And my sister’s marriage broke up, and she’s a single mom of two kids.”

  “I definitely see a pattern.”

  “Yup. Four generations of failed marriages. Divorce runs in my family the same way diabetes or hypertension runs in others.”

  Miranda nodded. It sounded like Jon’s mind was made up. This was a man who was against all the things she wanted...a fulfilling marriage, a family. Many a woman had probably happily gone into a seasonal affair with him convinced they would be the one to get him to change his mind...and many a woman had probably been bitterly disappointed when he broke up with them. “That sounds like nothing more than an unhappy coincidence, Jon. My parents have been married for thirty-four years, and both sets of my grandparents were happily married as well. I’m sure you’re not, well, cursed or anything like that.”

  Their conversation came to a temporary halt when Miranda’s cell phone rang. While she took down the information of the towing company who would change her tire and their estimated time of arrival, the waitress delivered their drinks and appetizer.

  “You were right,” she said after she hung up. “It’ll be about forty minutes before they get here.” She took a sip of her spritzer. The cool liquid felt refreshing to her mouth after a night of dancing and the stress of her car trouble. “You’re pretty good at this ballroom dancing thing. Why do I get the feeling you’ve done it before?”

  “Guilty as charged,” he replied, his grin revealing perfect teeth. “I actually grew up in the world of dance. My mother and grandmother ran a dance studio, the best one in the Minneapolis area, I might add.”

  Miranda nodded. “That would explain why you know about Cyd Charisse.”

  “And Stormy Weather, and any other dance movie. My mother had them all on the old VHS tapes they used in those days.” He grinned. “What’d you do, think I was gay?”

  Uncomfortable with admitting the truth, Miranda merely shrugged. Certainly not for long.

  “No, not me. My sister and I used to watch all those movies after we finished our homework while Mom taught classes. We practically lived at the studio when we were kids.”

  “That must have been a lot of fun.”

  He shrugged. “It was the only life we knew. My parents were divorced, so the studio was a second home to us. Mom even had a room set up in the back for us, with a table for eating and homework.”

  “You obviously have a knack for dancing.”

  “They were always short on male students, something I didn’t particularly appreciate when I was a kid, but by the time I got to junior high I realized what an advantage I had.” He smiled at the memory he obviously still found pleasant. “It was a great way to meet girls, because unlike some of the guys whose mothers made them take lessons, I was fairly good at it, and they all wanted to dance with me. I decided to take it up again, and maybe history will repeat itself. I’m still pretty new in town and don’t know a lot of people.”

  “How long have you been here?” she asked.

  “Just since May.”

  “Do you like it?”

  “Ask me again after the winter,” Jon joked. “But I’m sure that if I can handle Minnesota, I can handle North Dakota. At any rate, I’m planning on being here for awhile. I just bought a house.”

  “Oh, that’s exciting. Is it your first house?”

  “No. I had a little one-bedroom condo in Minneapolis. Right now it’s rented. It’s so hard to sell anything these days. This time I sprang for the real deal, a free-standing house. Actually, a log cabin.”

  “A log cabin?” Miranda repeated incredulously. “Like Abe Lincoln?”

  “Yeah, but with a few more creature comforts.” He looked up as the waitress delivered a large plate holding a pepperoni pizza cut into square pieces, plus two smaller plates and napkins. “I hope you don’t mind. I told the waitress to bring this while you were on the phone.” His eyes shone with mischief. “Uh, you do eat pepperoni, don’t you?”

  “What would make you think I don’t?”

  “It’s a long P-word, like persimmon and pomegranate.”

  She welcomed the opportunity to tease him as she helped herself to a square. “I was talking strictly fruits. Pepperoni is meat.”

  “Oh, that’s right, you did say fruit. I thought I might have missed something there. None of the black people I know dislike pepperoni.”

  She wondered how many African-Americans Jon actually knew.

  “So what brings you to our fair city, Legs?” he asked just before biting into a pizza square.

  “Nine months,” she replied.

  Jon looked puzzled, as she’d known he would. “I don’t get it. What’d you do, have a baby or something?”

  “No,” Miranda said with a smile. “I was out of work, and then got something part time, and it went on for nine months. The first permanent, full time job I was offered ended up being here. So here I am, making your fair city a little less fair.”

  They both chuckled at her little joke. “But more beautiful,” Jon added.

  To Miranda’s ears it sounded anything but corny.

  “What kind of work do you do, anyway?” he asked.

  “Physical therapy assistant. I do a lot of preliminary work with patients. I wanted to go on and become a therapist, but it’s really hard to get into school.”

  “Yeah, I’ve heard that it’s almost as rough trying to get in to study physical therapy as it is to get into vet school. So where do you work?”

  She named the managed healthcare service that employed her.

  “No shit! I work for them, too!”

  “You do?”

  “Yes. I’m the Director of Utilization Review.”

  “Sounds like a nice gig,” she observed. “So you have a nursing degree, huh?”

  “Yeah. It’s not like it used to be in the old days, when it was all women. My Master’s is in health services. I don’t think people realize what all a person can do with a nursing degree.”

  The Master’s didn’t hurt, either, she thought. “Other than changing bedpans?” she asked innocently.

  “Hey, never underestimate the value of good patient care, especially when you’re the patient.”

  They were finishing up their drinks when Miranda’s cell phone rang again, with a recorded announcement informing her that the tow truck would be arriving within five minutes. They drank up, and Jon hastily paid the bill. On the way out they stopped by the table where Jae Gallagher sat with her husban
d. Miranda had already been tipped off by their surname that Jae’s husband wasn’t Asian-American. Brian Gallagher was a toothily handsome man with light brown hair who, like Jon, exuded robust good health.