Love in a Small Town

by Curtiss Ann Matlock

  He realized he was poking his finger at her, and she was staring at him, and suddenly his high emotions scared him. He clamped his mouth shut, and then Molly turned away from him.

  He stared at her stiff back, then said, “I just don’t know what in the hell you want from me, Molly. Why don’t you just tell me that—what do you want?”

  She whirled on him. “I have told you. And what good is it when I have to tell you—to ask you? I want you to think of it on your own. I’m tired of beggin’ for you."

  “You’re drivin’ me crazy. You know that?” And he shoved from the fence and stalked away to his Corvette.

  Molly stood there and watched him go. She gripped the top plank of the wooden fence, and when the Corvette went up the hill onto the road, she turned and kicked the bottom plank with all her might, and the darn old thing splintered and fell in two.

  She stalked into the cottage, changed her clothes, and without pause stalked out again to the garden shed for tools to fix the fence. She patched the break with an old piece of two-by-four, and when she finished hammering the last nail she went to hammering on the ground until her arm gave out.

  Then her mother was there, bending over her. “Molly . . . Molly Jean, honey.”

  “Oh, Mama, I’m just so stupid. I want Tommy Lee more than anything, and I just keep pushin’ him away. I can’t stop. What’s wrong with me? . . . Oh, Mama . . . what’s wrong with me?”

  “Oh, baby, you’re just a woman.” Mama gathered her close. “A woman in love with a man.”

  In Mama’s estimation there was no harder place on earth for a woman to be than in love with a man.

  * * * *

  As Tommy Lee drove, fast, over to beat up Sam, he reflected that he might not be thinking straight. He rebuked this thought. He was thinking straight and knew, for a change, exactly what he wanted to do.

  It seemed to him that all of life was one big confusion, and that too many times he had not acted on those rare times when he knew exactly what he wanted to do. He had had the brief inclination to toss Molly to the ground and screw her so that she had to shut up. That had seemed one way to drag her past all this crap she kept throwing in the way. But the certainty of that course had passed before he could make up his mind to act on it. He knew now he should have done exactly that. He felt certain now, deep in his bones, that no matter what the experts said, sex could melt a lot of resentments.

  He wished he could make up his mind more easily and stick to it. His poor inability to make up his mind struck him, in that moment, as a great failing. And it was simply one more reason for him to beat the shit out of Sam. At least he had made up his mind on that score. Sam deserved it, and Tommy Lee wanted to do it.

  Sam answered, barefoot and shirt open, threw the door wide and told Tommy Lee to come on in, which seemed a really stupid thing to do for a man who had been flirting with another man’s wife.

  Tommy Lee said, “You asshole,” and sprang at him, giving release to the ball of frustration in his gut. Sam managed to block his punch but went stumbling backward, over a counter stool. Tommy Lee jumped on him, and they went grunting, grappling, and punching around the small living room, knocking over lamps and vases and books, collapsing a drawing table.

  At last, spent, they broke apart. Sam’s nose was bleeding. Tommy Lee tasted blood and tongued a crack in his bottom lip. He hauled himself to his feet.

  “It’s a low thing to do,” he said, his swelling lip causing the words to sound strange, “goin’ after a best friend’s wife.”

  Sam, rising up on his knees, said, “You threw her away, man, so don’t go blamin’ me for your own mistakes.” Sniffing, he got to his feet and wiped his nose with his T-shirt. Then he lifted his eyes to Tommy Lee. “I’ve loved Molly for a long time, but you never did see it. Why? Damn, T.L., I’m your best friend, and you know everything else about me. Why didn’t you see how I felt about Molly?” He shook his head. “I guess you never could believe that she might look at someone else besides you. I guess you thought she’d be there whenever you decided to look her way. Well, I feel for you, buddy, but I think I have a chance now, and I’m not givin’ it up. I think I can make her happy.”

  “I saw it all along,” Tommy Lee said flatly. “I just ignored it because I figured our friendship was more important than bein’ jealous. I thought our friendship was . . . ah, hell . . ."

  Going for the door, he caught sight of a picture hanging there beside it. It was a drawing Sam had done of the old Chevy Tommy Lee had had when they were teens. Lifting it off its hook, Tommy Lee smashed it on the floor and then walked out.

  Chapter 18

  What I Meant to Say

  When Sam called, Molly was across the hall in the tiny storage room-kitchen, at the coffeemaker that she shared with Jaydee and his secretary, Sophia. Even while she poured herself a cup of coffee, she had one foot turned toward the door, one ear listening for the telephone in her office.

  Molly had been expecting Tommy Lee to call ever since their awful quarrel. Hoping, feeling foolish, grasping at expectation, she had carried the telephone around the cottage with her. She had taken it into the bathroom with her and as far out the door as it would go when she’d given Marker his grain, and then into bed with her. Ace got into such a fit over it being in the bed, he wouldn’t come lie with her.

  Rennie had called to chat. Walter had called, wanting to know the possibility of all the new clothes Kaye was buying being a tax deduction, since she had started selling Country Interior Designs. When Molly said no, Kaye had to take over and argue the point for ten minutes, until Molly said, “I don’t make the laws, Kaye. Call the IRS,” which infuriated Kaye so much she hung up. Shortly afterward, Season had called to simply give her love and Lillybeth’s, too. First thing in the morning, before eight o’clock, a man had called selling light bulbs guaranteed to last ten years.

  Tommy Lee had not called, after they had had the worst fight of all their years together.

  “Why don’t you call him?” Mama suggested when she came over bright and early that morning, dressed this time, bringing cinnamon-raisin biscuits she’d gotten up at Hardee’s.

  “Well, because,” Molly said. She had tried to get herself to call Tommy Lee, but each time she got no further than lifting the receiver before she quickly hung up. “He should call me. He’s the one who never cared enough to stop me from leaving, and he hasn’t asked me to come home, and he is the one who stalked away mad yesterday. I don’t think he wants to hear from me."

  “That’s pride talking.”

  Molly gave her a look that said: You are stepping on dangerous ground.

  Of course that didn’t faze Mama, who went right on with, “You should just call him up and tell him how you feel. How you really feel, which is that you want to make up.”

  “I can’t,” Molly said.

  “Can’t and won’t are about the same thing,” Mama said and got up and left.

  Molly called after her, “You’re one to be talkin’,” but that really was a weak retort, and really childish, too, which did nothing to help Molly’s poor mood.

  Then, at the office, when the phone did ring, it was like a fire alarm, because Molly had switched it to the loudest setting to make certain she would hear it should she be in the bathroom when it rang. At her desk in Jaydee’s offices, Sophia yelped. Molly started for the phone and realized she was carrying the pot in one hand and the cup in the other, hot coffee sloshing all over her hand. Phone ringing, Molly crying, “Yeow!” and shoving pot and cup onto the counter, patting a napkin on her hand as she sprinted across the hall and to her desk, tripping on the chair she’d left pushed out and answering breathlessly.

  Hearing Sam’s voice, it took her a moment to bring her mind around that it wasn’t Tommy Lee.

  “Oh, hello, Sam.” Then Molly lowered her voice and carried the telephone as far as the cord would reach across to the door. Sophia was watching from her desk with a stretched-out ear. Molly pushed the door closed with her h
ip.

  Sam asked her to lunch, and when she declined, he asked her to supper. Slowly lowering herself into her chair, Molly gripped the receiver and told him she didn’t think it was a good idea for them to go on seeing each other.

  “The truth of it is that it’s more than friendship between us, and there just isn’t room for that right now.”

  It occurred to her that she sounded overly dramatic, and she had an instant of feeling silly. It was possible that she had misconstrued Sam’s kindness to her as something more.

  But he said, “I’m in this, Molly. I don’t see how you can ignore that.”

  His voice was sexy, like he could make it when he wanted to. Molly realized she was damp between her breasts—Sam’s tone was the sort that made a woman realize she had breasts.

  She got ahold of herself. “Oh, Sam, I’m tryin’ to be honest with you. I’m confused enough with my marriage right now, without adding . . . well, whatever it is we would be adding. I have nothin’ to offer you. It wouldn’t be fair to you. . . . I’d just be usin’ you.”

  “So, use me. I’m beggin’ for it.”

  She swallowed, smiling and teary at the same time. “I can’t, Sam . . . and I don’t want to cause an argument between you and Tommy Lee.” Although she wasn’t certain Tommy Lee would argue over her.

  “Too late,” Sam said.

  “Too late?”

  “Tommy Lee and I already had our fight, so you don’t need to worry about that.”

  “You had a fight?” She shouldn’t feel excited. That was awful of her, she thought, trying to shove the emotion aside, even as she held her breath to hear details.

  All Sam said was, “Just a bit of an argument. Nothin’ serious."

  “Oh, Sam.” She rubbed her forehead. “I still can’t see you,” she said, the words squeezing out her throat.

  “Okay. I can accept that . . . but I’m still here,” he said and hung up.

  Molly replaced the receiver and sat there at her desk, staring at papers in front of her, hearing Sam’s voice. It was true, she thought. She could say no to Sam all the day long, but the fact was that he was still there, offering his warm eyes and strong hands and just about anything she may want from him. And her lonely heart knew it.

  Her body began to melt with the thought, to seem to buzz and jingle and seep out her toes. She did not think she could stand to go on this way, needing something but uncertain as to the exact nature of the need. A yearning, that’s what it was.

  Then, as she pondered this and tried to find a way to pacify the awful yearning, the telephone rang again.

  Molly stared at it, actually doubting she had heard the ring. But it came again, and she jumped. Was it Sam again? What would she say to him? Maybe it was Tommy Lee.

  She snatched up the receiver. “Hello?”

  “Molly, this is JoEllen Bloom, and Tommy Lee’s lost a bunch of accounts on his computer, and he’s drivin’ me crazy.”

  JoEllen’s speech pattern was to string all of her sentences together with hardly a breath. She was always in a hurry. As the owner, installer, and maintenance person for the local computer store, which she’d opened after she’d retired from the air force, she was kept busy. She said it was working all of her life with computers that made her go racing through her days.

  Molly, gripping the receiver, listened as JoEllen said that she couldn’t get out to help Tommy Lee today because she was in the midst of putting in a new system for Dr. Greene, who dealt with life and death and so of course had to come first.

  “Tommy Lee has called me at least half a dozen times, and the last time he hollered so loud that standing next to me Eugenia jumped and threw files for three different patients all up in the air, and now their records are all screwed up, so I just hope none of them needed a heart transplant.”

  Tommy Lee did get crazy over a computer. For someone so smart about any intricate mechanical thing, he was awfully dumb about using a computer. He’d taken lessons JoEllen offered when she set their system up, but he had never gotten very far. When working at the computer, he tended to get so wrought up that every muscle in his body got locked, except his knees, which he bounced at racing speed. He had ended up turning all computer operation over to Molly, who appeared to have an innate ability for working a computer. She talked to it, as if it were a human intelligence at her disposal. This drove Tommy Lee wild. He would walk out of the room when she did that.

  “I know about you two,” JoEllen said in a low tone, as if it were a secret, “but, Lord, Molly, he’s drivin’ me crazy, so do you suppose you could go help him?”

  Molly cleared her throat. “I’ll go see what I can do.” She went to the rest room and freshened her makeup, combed her hair. She started to dab on Chanel, told herself to stop it, then dabbed quickly down her bosom. Out on the road she turned the El Camino’s air-conditioning on full blast and willed herself not to sweat.

  She made herself slow down for Eulalee Harris's chickens wandering all over the road. At the entry to her own drive, she stopped, the memory of her and Tommy Lee’s fight coming back and causing her to sink. She checked herself in the mirror and applied fresh lipstick. Her hand was shaking. Then she went on down the drive and pulled the El Camino to a stop in front of the garage doors, beside Tommy Lee’s old green pickup. Jake came to greet Molly as she went to the back steps. “Hello, fella.” She let her fingers linger in the thick fur at his neck.

  Tommy Lee was in the office. She heard his cursing as she entered the house. Suddenly he came storming out and almost knocked her down. Upon seeing her, his eyes went wide.

  Molly said, “JoEllen called. She said you’re havin’ computer problems."

  He stared at her. His bottom lip had a small scab— and there was a bruise by his eye!

  Had he and Sam come to blows? Sam hadn’t said that. Molly wasn’t going to ask. She dropped her gaze. “I’ll go in and take a look at it,” she said and slipped around him, hurrying through to the office.

  She sat in the chair, heard Tommy Lee’s footsteps, the swish of his jeans as he came behind her. She smelled the scent of him. Her pulse beat hard, and all of her body listened for his touch. Just touch me, Tommy Lee.

  The computer blinked at her: bad or missing command interpreter.

  Molly said, “What happened?”

  “Hell, I don’t know. If I knew what happened, I would have corrected it.”

  Tommy Lee guessed reading the instruction manual was his first mistake. Using the damn machine at all was his first mistake. Pencil and paper didn’t have to be plugged in, and he’d long ago mastered the use of them. He shifted from foot to foot and looked downward at Molly’s shiny, silky hair. At the creamy skin of her softly rounded shoulders showing below the curve of the sleeveless dress. He imagined putting his hand there, slipping his thumb beneath the fabric of the dress.

  “Well, what accounts were you workin’ with?” Molly asked. “I sort of need a place to start.”

  He shifted his stance again. “Uh . . ."

  He pulled over the invoices he’d been working with. His arm brushed her shoulder, and he jumped slightly. Maybe she wouldn’t want him touching her. He didn’t want to show he cared. He wasn’t the one who had walked out.

  “These. I thought I’d just post ‘em up, but I saved them in the wrong place. I found ‘em, but, well, hell, I don’t know what happened.”

  There was no way he could explain what he’d done. He felt foolish. The entire situation, Molly right there under his nose after all they had said to each other yesterday, acting like nothing was wrong, was confusing. He had no idea what he should do, what he should feel.

  Molly started typing. “I told you I would go on takin’ care of the business records.”

  He didn’t have anything to say to that. Her saying that annoyed him, as did her being able to get the machine to work. As he watched, she typed as if she knew exactly what to type, and the screen changed. He turned and went into the kitchen and got a can of Coca-Cola from
the refrigerator, wandered around the kitchen for a minute. He didn’t want to watch her work the computer when he had such trouble with it. That did not seem the correct nature of things.

  It struck him that he was glad she was there. Almost glad enough to cry, which shook him considerably.

  Then suddenly Molly cried, “Oh! Tommy Lee . . . oh!”

  He sprinted for the office. Molly was dancing around and hollering, “Fire! Fire!” in front of the computer, where a veil of smoke wafted out from the disk drive. “Oh, God—get the fire extinguisher,” she yelled and dashed through the door.

  One long stride, and Tommy Lee pulled the desk away from the wall, reached down, and jerked the computer’s plug out of the receptacle. Then he had to grab the extinguisher from Molly before she soaked foam all over everything. “It’s okay now.” The smoke had faded to a dying spiral slithering out of the disk drive.

  “Oh, my goodness,” Molly said, shaking.

  “It was just a little smoke,” Tommy Lee said, feeling on firm ground once more. Mechanical breakdowns he could handle. He took her hand. “Here . . . sit down. Are you okay?” Molly had gone white as the wall.

  "It just surprised me is all. Whoever thought a computer would catch fire?”

  “It’s electrical. Anything electrical can catch fire. But you never spray it with anything wet, at least not until it’s unplugged.”

  “I know . . . you’ve told me. I just got so jangled. Fire just scares me.”

  “Bein’ scared is better than bein’ unprepared,” Tommy Lee allowed. People who lived as far as they did from a fire department were trained by circumstances to have a healthy fear of fire. They kept fire extinguishers handy and taught the kids early how to use them.