Heartstopper

by Joy Fielding

  Sandy stared at the sheriff’s wife. What was she talking about?

  “That, and the word canoodling,” Pauline continued. “Celebrities always canoodle. Have you noticed? You’re an English teacher. What does that mean exactly?”

  “Where did this happen?” Rita asked, ignoring Pauline, her eyes urging Sandy to do the same.

  “I don’t know where exactly. Somewhere between Citrus Grove and Admiral Road. Right by this abandoned, old farmhouse at the end of a big field. It was really creepy.”

  Pauline’s eyes narrowed in concentration. “You must mean the old Kimble house. What were you doing all the way out there, for God’s sake?”

  “Being a Good Samaritan.”

  “Good and stupid,” Rita corrected. “When are you going to learn?”

  “Do I send out mixed messages?” Sandy asked suddenly.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do I not make myself clear?”

  “What’s she talking about?” Pauline asked.

  Sandy couldn’t help but laugh. “Guess that answers that question.” What a night, she was thinking, as their waitress deposited her green-apple martini on the table and Pauline requested another gin and tonic.

  “Nothing more for her,” John called from the back room, obviously keeping an eye on things.

  “Don’t listen to him,” Pauline told the waitress, managing not to move her mouth, so that the words slid off her bottom lip into the surrounding air. “The Kimble house was quite the place in its time,” she continued, as if the two sentences were connected. “Very modern. Had a basement and everything. Now it’s just spooky. Kind of like the Bates Motel. You know, from Psycho. Now, that was a great movie. I can’t believe Mr. Lipsman would do such a thing,” she continued in the same breath. “What was he thinking?”

  Sandy was having a hard time keeping up with the various detours in Pauline’s conversation. “He was pretty drunk,” Sandy said pointedly. “We don’t always think too clearly when we drink too much.”

  “I can’t believe you actually drove that moron home,” Rita marveled.

  “Well, I couldn’t very well leave him standing in front of the Bates Motel, now could I?”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “I don’t know. I just couldn’t.”

  “Oh, God,” Rita said, her eyes widening in alarm.

  “Do you think that was sending him a mixed message?” Sandy asked, unnerved by the disapproving look on Rita’s face. “What’s the matter?” she asked, her eyes following the direction of Rita’s gaze.

  “Don’t look,” Rita warned.

  Sandy spun around in her seat, looked toward the entrance. Her husband was standing just inside the front door. Beside him was Kerri Franklin.

  “Oh, God. Please tell me I’m hallucinating.”

  “I told you not to look.”

  Pauline swiveled around in her chair. “Well, well. Look who’s here.”

  “Have they seen us?” Sandy sank down low in her seat, pushing her shoulders up around her neck, like a turtle retreating into its shell.

  “Not yet,” Rita said.

  “What are they doing?”

  “They’re sitting down in one of the booths at the front.”

  “‘Of all the gin joints in all the world,’” Pauline said in her best Humphrey Bogart imitation, “‘they have to walk into this one.’”

  “I don’t believe this,” Sandy said. “What are they doing now?”

  “Just sitting there.”

  Sandy snuck her head out of her protective shell to peek in their direction. Ian and Kerri were sitting across from one another, their hands clasped together in the middle of the table. She turned quickly away. “You didn’t tell me they were holding hands.”

  “I didn’t think that detail was necessary.”

  “You ever notice that nobody names their kids Humphrey anymore?” Pauline asked, as if she were in the middle of an entirely different conversation. “It’s gone the way of Gertrude and Ethel and Homer. Now we have names like Tiffany and Ashleigh and Tyler. Although Richard Gere named his kid Homer. But that’s celebrities for you. When they aren’t canoodling, they’re naming their kids Homer.”

  Again Sandy found herself staring at the sheriff’s wife. Where did she get these thoughts?

  “Has John seen her yet?” Pauline asked.

  “Seen who?”

  “Suzy Slut,” Pauline answered, the words blasting from her mouth as if shot from a cannon, short explosions of sound that were loud enough to pierce the eardrums of everyone in the vicinity. “She was sleeping with my husband, you know,” she continued, her voice gaining strength with each syllable, “before she started sleeping with yours.”

  What?! thought Sandy.

  “Speaking of husbands,” Rita began, eyes moving warily from side to side, “I think we may have caught the attention of a few.”

  “It’s been going on for years. On-again, off-again, on-again, off-again,” Pauline continued as John advanced toward her. “Of course the idiot doesn’t think I know anything about it. Isn’t that right, sweetheart?”

  “Okay, Pauline,” John told her firmly. “That’s enough mischief for one night. Time to go home.”

  “You want to go home? Now? When things are finally getting interesting?”

  John glanced toward the front of the crowded restaurant, flinching visibly when his eyes connected with Kerri Franklin’s. “It’s okay, everybody,” he said, eyes retreating. “Go on about your business. The lady’s just had a few too many gin and tonics.” He made a grab for his wife’s elbow.

  “The lady’s just had a little too much bullshit,” Pauline countered, pulling her arm out of his reach. “Too many years of too much bullshit.”

  “Pauline …”

  “John,” Pauline parried, stretching out the word as if it were an elastic band.

  “You’re embarrassing yourself.”

  “You mean I’m embarrassing you, is what you mean.”

  “Let’s get out of here before you say something you’ll regret.”

  “Au contraire,” Pauline said, pulling her shoulders back and smoothing out the front of her ivory silk blouse with unsteady fingers. “The only things I ever regret saying are the things I haven’t said.” She struggled gamely to her feet, having to balance herself against the table to keep from falling over. “For instance.” She stopped, looked around the room, as if searching for an example. “I very much regret not having said anything about you and that bloated, blond bimbo you’ve been boinking all these years.”

  Sandy almost smiled. Bloated, boinking, blond bimbo, she repeated silently. A perfect example of alliteration. She took a sip of her martini and found herself wondering which came first, Pauline’s drinking or her husband’s infidelity.

  “Is there something you’d like to say to me, Pauline?” Kerri asked, suddenly appearing at the side of their table. Sandy took another quick sip of her drink.

  “Boobs and baubles,” Rita whispered under her breath.

  Boobs, baubles, and bloated, boinking, blond bimbos, Sandy recited in her head, almost starting to enjoy herself. Then Ian entered her line of vision.

  “What’s going on here?” he asked the sheriff.

  “Nothing to get all exercised about,” John said, finally succeeding in pulling Pauline away from the table.

  “You don’t get a body like that from exercising,” Pauline huffed in Kerri’s direction, obviously having misunderstood the word. “You get it courtesy of MasterCard.”

  “Priceless,” Rita whispered under her breath, and Sandy smiled in spite of herself.

  “Something funny?” Ian asked.

  Sandy’s eyes dropped to her feet. What we could use right now is an earthquake, she was thinking, something that would split open the hardwood floor and swallow everybody up.

  “I take it you know all about your girlfriend’s affair with my husband,” Pauline said to Ian.

  “I never concern myself with things
that happened before my time.”

  “What time is it?” Pauline asked.

  “Crazy bitch,” Kerri muttered.

  “I may be a bitch,” Pauline said. “But I’m definitely not crazy.”

  “Okay, Pauline,” John said. “Now you are embarrassing me.”

  “Oh, poor baby.”

  “We’re going home.”

  “Go to hell.”

  “First I’m taking you home.”

  Again Pauline managed to elude his grasp. “Would you just look at him,” she scoffed. “The town hero. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, Poor guy, he puts killers like Cal Hamilton behind bars but he can’t control his own wife. Did you know about his affair with Kerri Franklin?” she asked one of the men leaning against the closest pool table. “Or did you sleep with her too?”

  “Pauline, why don’t you let me drive you home?” Sandy interjected, jumping to her feet.

  “Why are you being so nice about this?” Pauline demanded, suddenly turning on her. “At least my husband tried to be reasonably discreet.”

  “Sheriff,” Ian pleaded.

  “Why haven’t you filed for divorce?” Pauline continued. “What are you waiting for?”

  “The woman has a point,” Rita said out of the side of her mouth.

  “Okay, that’s it.” John Weber grabbed Pauline’s arm and guided her roughly toward the front of the restaurant.

  When they reached the door, Pauline dug in her heels, spun back around. “You are so much better off without him,” she shouted at Sandy before John managed to usher her out the door.

  For several seconds, nobody moved. Then Rita reached down, grabbed her purse from the floor. “Well, I don’t know about you, but I think I’ve had just about enough excitement for one night.”

  Kerri nodded agreement. “I should probably go check on my mother,” she said to no one in particular.

  Ian reached into the pocket of his black pants, handed Kerri the keys to his Jaguar. “If you don’t mind, I think I’ll stay and finish my beer,” he said, looking directly at Sandy. “Why don’t you check on your mother and then pick me up in say”—he glanced at his watch—“half an hour.”

  Kerri hesitated.

  “Half an hour,” he repeated.

  Kerri nodded, balancing on the tips of her toes, the narrow heels of her sling-back stilettos lifting right off the floor, to plant a proprietary kiss on the side of Ian’s lips. “Nice seeing you again, Sandy,” she said.

  “Twice in one night,” Sandy acknowledged. “How lucky can I get?”

  “You coming?” Rita asked Sandy as Kerri sashayed her way past the bar, all eyes on her backside.

  Ian’s shoulder brushed against Sandy’s. “Stay,” he said.

  Sandy’s eyes shot to his. Dear God, what was going on? “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “You coming?” Rita said again.

  “I might as well stay and finish my martini.”

  Rita glanced from Sandy to Ian and back again. “You sure?”

  “She’s sure,” Ian answered for her.

  “I’ll call you tomorrow,” Sandy said, bending over to kiss her friend’s cheek.

  “No mixed messages,” Rita whispered in her ear.

  And then she was gone, and Ian was signaling for the waitress. “Could you bring my beer from the booth at the front?” he was asking, as Sandy grabbed her martini from the table and followed him to a small table in a relatively quiet corner of the restaurant. “You want anything to eat?” he asked, settling into his chair and ignoring the curious glances of the couples sitting nearby. Tomorrow, Pauline’s little outburst would be all over town, as would the fact Sandy was enjoying a drink with her estranged husband.

  Was enjoying the right word? Sandy wondered, not sure what she was feeling. “No, thanks. I’m not hungry.”

  “Thought you always liked a little late-night snack.”

  Sandy felt an unwanted twinge at the reference to their shared past, and she struggled to keep it from registering on her face. “Not so much anymore. They say it isn’t a very good idea to eat anything after ten o’clock.” Did they? she wondered.

  “Anything?” he asked provocatively.

  Sandy tried not to read anything sexual in the inference—was he really flirting with her?—and kept her eyes on the table.

  “Don’t tell me you’re worried about gaining weight.” Why were they talking about her weight? Why the suggestive banter? Was he hinting at a possible reconciliation? Was he testing the waters before breaking the news to Kerri?

  “You look terrific,” he told her, as he’d said earlier.

  “Thank you.” She leaned back in her chair and looked him right in the eye. He was staring at her as if he expected her to return the compliment. “So do you,” she complied, then bit her tongue to keep from saying more. The truth was he looked better than terrific. The truth was he’d never looked better.

  “I saw your car in the parking lot,” he told her. “I knew you were here.” The waitress brought over his beer. Ian lifted the tall glass into the air, clicked it against hers. “What are we toasting?” he asked, as if the toast had been her idea.

  Sandy wasn’t sure what to make of his latest confession. “To Megan,” she said, deciding her husband would make himself clear when he was ready. He always did.

  “She was pretty amazing tonight, wasn’t she?”

  “She certainly was.”

  “I had no idea she could sing and dance.”

  “She’s full of surprises lately.”

  “Such as?”

  Sandy shrugged. She had no idea how much Megan confided in her father these days, and she didn’t want to betray her trust by speaking out of turn. If Megan wanted her father to know anything about Gregg Watt, she’d have to tell him herself. Still, it felt strange not to be able to talk to her husband openly about their children, even stranger to be talking to him at all.

  “She’s turning into a very beautiful young woman,” Ian said.

  “Yes, she is.”

  “Looking more like her mother every day.”

  Okay, so what’s going on? Sandy wondered again. That was two compliments in as many minutes. Two more than he’d given her in the past two months, possibly even the last two years. She should ask, she decided, opening her mouth to speak. Instead she clicked her glass against his a second time and said, “To our son.”

  “To Tim,” Ian echoed. “Looks as if the sheriff’s daughter has a crush on him.”

  “She has good taste.”

  Again Ian clicked his glass against hers. “To new beginnings.”

  “New beginnings,” she agreed. What kind of new beginnings?

  Suddenly he leaned across the table and kissed her.

  She drew back. “What are you doing?”

  “I’ve been wanting to do that all night. Ever since I saw you in the auditorium.” He leaned forward, kissed her again.

  This time she felt her lips open, her mouth responding to the gentle ministrations of his tongue. Was she really kissing him back? She pulled away slowly, reluctantly. He looked at her and smiled.

  “We should talk about our divorce,” he said.

  Sandy almost laughed. Instead she waited for him to finish the thought. I don’t want one, she waited for him to say. I’ve changed my mind. I want to come home. But he said nothing, only sat there smiling at her from across the table. “What?” she finally managed to spit out.

  “We should talk about our divorce,” he repeated, as if she hadn’t heard him the first time.

  “What about it?”

  “I know you still haven’t consulted a lawyer, so I thought that if you were amenable, you could just use mine. He’s already drawn up a settlement agreement that I think is more than fair. All you have to do is sign it.”

  Sandy sank back in her chair. “How very thoughtful of you.”

  “I thought it would make things easier on everyone,” he said, completely missing the sarcasm in her voi
ce. “Not to mention, less expensive.”

  “Is this a joke?” Was someone taping their exchange? Was she being “punked”?

  “You look surprised,” he said, managing to look surprised himself.

  “You just kissed me.”

  “And it was lovely. I hope to do it again soon.”

  “Before or after our divorce?”

  “Before and after.”

  “What?”

  “There’s no reason our divorce can’t be amicable, or that we can’t continue to be friends. Friends with benefits,” he added slyly, reaching across the table to stroke the back of her hand. “Isn’t that the current expression?”

  Pauline would probably know the answer to that one, Sandy thought, lowering her hand to her lap, and deciding never to drink another green-apple martini as long as she lived. Clearly they distorted her brain waves. “Just so we’re clear,” she said, “you’re saying you want a divorce, but you’d still like the option of having sex with me every now and then. Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Why not? Divorced couples do it all the time.”

  “Oh. I didn’t realize that.”

  “We’re obviously still very attracted to each other. And we were always so good together,” he reminded her.

  “And Kerri?” Sandy reminded him. “How good together are the two of you?”

  Ian lowered his chin, stole a sideward glance toward the front of the restaurant. “Truthfully”—he smiled—“being with Kerri is a bit like being on a trampoline.”

  Sandy stared at her husband in slack-jawed amazement. “How do you do that?” she asked when she finally found her voice.

  “How do I do what?”

  “How do you manage to make a mind-bogglingly stupid statement like that without any obvious shame or embarrassment?”

  This time it was Ian who looked surprised. “What—now you’re getting indignant on Kerri’s behalf? Is that what’s happening here?”

  Was it? Sandy wondered. Or was she finally realizing just what a piece of work her husband really was? “You are such an asshole,” she marveled, the word escaping her lips before she even realized it was on her tongue.

  “There’s no need for name-calling.”