One True Theory of Love

by Laura Fitzgerald

  “I love you, Meg,” he said. “I can’t help but worry.”

  Meg’s heart surged. “You love me?”

  “Can’t you tell?”

  “I can tell,” she said. “It comes through in everything you do.”

  Ahmed, I’m going to reveal a secret. I have this thing about your forearms. Don’t get me wrong—I like virtually every aspect of you—but the way the tendons in your forearms flex when you make even the smallest of movements . . . Well. It’s quite the turn-on, because I’m reminded of your strength.

  I have no doubt you’d lay down your life for me and Henry, but that’s not the kind of strength I’m talking about. You’re strong in how you think. How you reason. How you love. You’re strong from the inside out.

  Henry’s got Violet. Marita’s got Lucas. Who did you ever have? I wish I’d known you when we were children. I would have been the little girl who always made you smile.

  I wish I’d been your first American teacher. I would have told you how smart you were. I wish I’d been your father. I would have told you how brave you were. I wish I’d been your mother. I would have told you how much you were loved. Whatever you missed in your life—whatever you needed and didn’t get—I wish I could have given it to you.

  I guess this is my way of saying: I love you, too.

  “I thought we were going to have sex tonight,” Meg said with a pout.

  “Oh, we are,” Ahmed said.

  “Well?” Meg looked around the romantically lackluster room. “Our first time together is kind of a big deal. I don’t need a candlelit dinner but . . . I don’t know . . . something?”

  “I would’ve liked to hire a private jet and flown us to Venice and wined and dined you and taken you on one of those gondola rides. . . .” He shrugged. “But there wasn’t enough time to plan it.”

  “A single orchid would have been lovely.” Meg picked up his TIME magazine and waved it as evidence. “I know the bird flu’s a fascinating topic, but if I may be so bold, I’d like to think that having sex with me might prove fascinating for you, too. Worthy of some preliminary effort, anyway.”

  “Oh, Meg. You poor girl.” He made a sympathetic face. “You’re not asking for much, are you? A rose-petal trail to the bedroom. A fire in the fireplace. Just a little romance, right? I’m sorry. What a lousy boyfriend I’ve turned out to be.”

  “You’re not lousy,” she assured him. “You’re wonderful. Just . . . surprisingly unromantic.”

  Ahmed stood and held out his hand to her. “Come with me a minute.” He pulled her up, grabbed her sweater and helped her slip it back on, then led her to his back door. “Like I said, I wanted to take you to Venice, but I know we’ve got to pick up Henry by eight thirty.”

  Meg gasped when he opened the door. His entire walled-in backyard twinkled with candles in hurricane jars—there were fifty, at least. Overwrought Italian music was playing, the same sort that played at the Venetian in Vegas, and his three-tiered fountain gurgled in the background. His wide canvas hammock was equipped with cozy blankets to balance against the autumn chill, and a small table nearby was set with cheese, dried fruit, nuts, two wineglasses and a bottle of wine.

  “The wine’s a Bordeaux,” he said. “Off theme, but I don’t know my Italian wines very well and the guy at Fifty-eight Degrees was busy with another customer.”

  “This is awesome.” Meg laughed and then socked him in the arm. “You had me completely fooled.”

  Ahmed rubbed his arm. “So you’ll forgive me for pulling a fast one on you?”

  “I might forgive you.” When she put her arms around his neck, he slipped his around her waist and pressed her against him. “I haven’t decided yet.”

  He gave her an oh so meaningful look. “I’ll do anything to get back in your good graces.”

  “Anything? Really?” Meg meant for her voice to be teasing, but he’d begun kissing her neck, which was incredibly distracting. Her voice came out more as a whimper, instead, decidedly not the impression she wanted to give. When Ahmed looked at her uncertainly, she knew he was wondering if she was nervous, perhaps having second thoughts. Which was a ridiculous idea.

  “Don’t you be looking at me like that,” she said.

  He smiled. “How am I supposed to look at you?”

  Meg kissed him with months’ worth of pent-up longing. It was the kiss of a woman who was about to have sex after not having had it for a very long time, indeed. Ahmed responded with a soft groan and looked drunk with desire.

  “Like that.” Meg gave him a slow smile. “You’re supposed to look at me exactly like that. How much time have we got left?”

  “None to waste,” Ahmed said.

  Meg slipped her sweater off. “It’s a good thing I’m naked under this dress, then.”

  His eyes widened. “Nothing under the dress?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Prove it,” he said.

  Meg had to make a quick decision. She could be bold and whip off the dress and give him a memory he’d never forget. Or she could be her usual, slightly more inhibited self.

  Her usual self won out.

  “How about a glass of that wine?” she asked.

  “Ah, yes.” Ahmed turned graciously to uncork the bottle and pour them some, while Meg chastised herself. He’d been hoping for the brazen off-with-the-dress option, of course. And now what he’d always remember was how she hadn’t done it. He’d remember how she’d wimped out.

  Meg didn’t want to be a wimp, not where Ahmed was concerned, so while his back was to her, she slipped out of the dress and stood naked except for her three-inch not-quite-spiked heels and shivered, from both the thrill of the moment and the chill in the air, as she waited for him to notice.

  It didn’t take but a moment. When he turned, completely unsuspecting, a wineglass in each hand, his breath caught at the sight of her. “Wow,” he said. “I feel overdressed.”

  “You are overdressed,” she said. “And it’s lonely being naked alone.”

  “I’d hate for you to be lonely,” he said.

  “So come on over.” Ahmed started over, keeping his eyes on hers. “You can shift your eyes downward if you want,” she said. “In fact, I’ll be offended if you don’t. I might even put the dress back on.”

  “Please don’t.” He handed her a glass of wine and kissed her. The distance he left between them was an unpardonable tease.

  “I’m cold,” she said. “Warm me up.”

  He enfolded her in his arms, and the warmth of his body and the heat of his tongue were the perfect antidote to the chilly desert night. Meg shivered, and they’d only just begun.

  “The blankets,” she said. “Let’s get under the blankets.”

  “Ah, but the moonlight.”

  “You cornball,” she said. “Besides being cold, I’ve never been very good at having sex standing up.”

  He laughed. “You’re so practical.”

  “I’m lustful,” she reminded him. “And time is of the essence. And I am cold. It’s November, you know.”

  Things moved quickly from there. Meg set their wineglasses on the table, lightly pushed him back onto the hammock and undressed him, starting with the buttons on his shirt and working her way downward, forgetting the cold and feeling more emboldened by the moment. Her forearm theory did hold true, as his naked body was darn near a work of art.

  And all hers! Time really was of the essence, so once she’d undressed him, she straddled him, guided him inside her, pulled the blankets over them and intertwined her fingers with his as they made love.

  Afterward, she whispered, “I’m keeping you, Ahmed Bourhani.”

  “You’d better,” he whispered back. “Because it’s lonely being naked alone.”

  Meg’s father called early the next morning, waking her.

  “Can I come over?”

  Meg yawned and dropped her head back on the pillow. It was six fifteen and her father was not an early riser. She sat up, worried. “What’s going on,
Dad? Are you okay?”

  “I’ve got an idea I want to run by you,” he said. “It can’t wait.”

  “Can’t you just tell me over the phone?” she said. “I’ve got school, you know.”

  “I know,” Phillip said. “But it’s a short week. You can take it a little easier Thanksgiving week, right?”

  What was with these people?

  “I’ll get the coffee going,” Meg said. “And just so you know, I have students for whom school is their happiest, safest place—the only place where everything works the way it’s supposed to, and some of them are heading into a long weekend of chaos. So no, I can’t take it easy this week.”

  While the coffee brewed, Meg brushed her teeth, stuck her hair up in a ponytail and threw on a long denim skirt and black sweater. She skipped a shower, as she’d taken a luxurious, dreamy, postsex bubble bath the previous night, after she’d picked Henry up from Bradley’s and gotten him off to bed. Instead, she simply washed her face, whipped on some foundation and lipstick and was ready in less than ten minutes.

  When her father tapped on the door, Meg opened it to find him pacing in front of it.

  “Wow!” he said. “You look great.”

  She looked sexually satisfied—that was how she looked. She’d seen it herself.

  “I’ve got a lot to be thankful for,” Meg said. “Coffee’s ready. Come on in.”

  Phillip stepped inside. “Henry’s still sleeping?”

  “Yep.”

  “How’s he been acting since Sunday?” he asked. “Did he talk any more about Jonathan and why he called him?”

  Things still weren’t entirely back to normal between mother and son, and there was a careful tenderness on both their parts. Henry’s behavior and Meg’s anger had taken a toll, but not a fatal one. “I don’t think he knows why he called him, but we’re going to be just fine,” she said. “I’m going to make sure that boy gets what he needs.”

  Which was herself and Ahmed, separately and together.

  “And Amy?” her father said. “Have you talked to her yet?”

  “Not yet.” As Meg poured their coffee, her father climbed onto a stool at the breakfast bar.

  “I’ve been thinking about that, too,” he said. “And I need to say something you might not like hearing, which is that Jonathan was always good to your sister. Remember how he came home from college to take her to senior prom after that Roger schmuck broke her heart? And how he encouraged her to send off her poems to that literary magazine? He was decent to her, and he never made it seem like he was doing it just for you.”

  Meg remembered Amy’s words: He was the brother I never had and always wanted.

  “But still,” Meg said. “She shouldn’t have deceived me.”

  “Trust that she had her reasons for not telling you,” Phillip implored her. “You’re her hero. She looks up to you so much. I’m sure she was afraid of losing your approval. Of losing your love.”

  Meg put out her lower lip. “I hadn’t thought of it like that.”

  “In the end, it’s not your business, anyway,” he said. “What happens between two people belongs to them alone. Like with your mother and me. While you’re involved on the periphery, the breakdown of our marriage really isn’t your issue.”

  “So you’re not mad I didn’t tell you about Mom’s new car?” Meg asked.

  Her father reddened.

  “Oooh.” Meg cringed. “Tell me you knew about the car.”

  “I know about the car,” he said. “I just haven’t figured out how she paid for it. I put the bulk of our money in an escrow account until we’ve got an agreement in place, and there wasn’t enough left in our joint account to buy a car.”

  “Maybe she financed it,” Meg said.

  “Your mother hates owing anybody anything,” Phillip said.

  “Maybe the new and improved Clarabelle doesn’t mind debt.”

  Phillip rolled his eyes. “Well, we both know that spouses and ex-spouses can be unpredictable. That’s what brings me here, actually.”

  He looked at Henry’s closed bedroom door and lowered his voice. “You need to go on the offensive with Jonathan or you’re going to get blindsided by something really ugly,” he said. “I have a gut feeling about this, Meg. There was nothing casual about his call. Life as you know it is about to change unless you’re very careful here.”

  We need to meet, he’d said.

  We have some unfinished business.

  Come on, Meg.

  Please.

  In the brief instant during which Meg closed her eyes, she remembered the totality of what it had been like to be with Ahmed the previous night. How completely good and right it had been. Life as she knew it was getting better every day.

  “How do we go on the offensive?” she asked.

  “I know a good lawyer,” Phillip said. “You and I should go see her today right after school. Jonathan could show up anywhere, at any time. You need to know your legal rights and be ready to throw them in his face if it comes to that.”

  Seeing a lawyer was about the last thing Meg wanted to do. She was a lover, not a fighter, and she’d always thought that all lawyers were good for was fighting.

  But Jonathan was a lawyer, and if he was going to go after Henry, he’d use the law to do it.

  “Okay,” Meg agreed. “In my father I trust.”

  Nine hours later, Meg pulled into the parking lot of the north-side law offices of Lerner, Grimes, Kerrigan and Cleaver, PC with just minutes to spare. Violet’s mother had agreed to watch Henry, so Meg had dropped him off there and then gotten delayed in Tucson’s typically bad traffic. She’d been uptight on the drive over, but her heart softened at the sight of her father pacing in the parking lot, hands in his pockets like he’d wait for her forever if he had to. She parked the car and joined him.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  Meg kissed his cheek. “Thanks for being here,” she said. “I know you’ve got a lot going on in your own life right now.”

  “I’m your dad,” he said. “I’d do anything for you, Magpie.”

  “I sure wish Henry had a father like you.”

  “Henry’s already got everything he needs—you,” Phillip said. “Anything more would simply be icing on the cake.”

  That’s Ahmed, Meg thought. Icing.

  As soon as she thought of him, she felt guilty. He’d left a message on her cell phone that morning, and she hadn’t called him back yet. She was glad she’d told him that Jonathan had called, but the sadness and worry she’d seen in his eyes had made her feel horrible. She’d decided to hold off revealing anything more until she had actual facts to share. This all might come to nothing. She only wanted to be prepared, and this way, she’d worry enough for them both. It was her burden to bear, not his.

  Phillip held the door open for her and then stepped ahead to the receptionist. “Phillip Goodman and Meg Clark for Patricia Lerner, please.”

  The reception area was rich—rich as in sensory rich, with its mahogany-and-velvet chairs and its oil painting in a gilded frame above the honest-to-god fireplace, and rich as in . . . just rich. Three-hundred-dollar-an-hour rich. Meg bit her lip as she looked around. Phillip had offered to pay for the consultation, but Meg wouldn’t let him. She was proud of the fact that she was sitting here at all and not crippled under a bathroom sink. She wasn’t a victim this time around, and that, in itself, was worth whatever cost she might incur.

  Her dad gestured for her to sit and then took the chair opposite her. He crossed his legs, perfectly at home. He’d been here before, Meg could tell. “This woman is your divorce lawyer, isn’t she, Dad?”

  Phillip nodded.

  “How’d you find her?” Meg asked.

  “Sandi used her for her divorce.” He checked his watch. “At five dollars a minute, she’d better not expect us to pay for the time we wait.” He was the world’s most impatient man when it came to waiting for people who billed for their time.

  “I didn’t realize Sandi
was divorced,” Meg said. “I thought she was still married to Bud.”

  “They divorced a few years back.” Phillip stood and began to pace. “Now he’s up in Montana, fly-fishing to his heart’s content.”

  “How did I not know that?” Meg said.

  Her father shrugged. “Now you do. Here she is.” Phillip said it loud enough for the approaching woman to hear.

  Some women just had their act together, and Patricia Lerner was one of them. Meg could tell it from her solid handshake alone. Dark-haired with a creamy complexion, she had a slight frame that disguised what Meg guessed was a lethal ability to come out victorious in any physical or intellectual confrontation. Just by looking at her, Meg got the feeling Patricia could shoot a gun, skin a deer, take down a bad guy with her bare hands and reduce a man to tears. She looked a little bloodthirsty, to be honest. Meg felt self-conscious as Patricia gave her the once-over. The suit Patricia wore probably cost more than Meg spent in an entire year on her own clothes. Meg supposed she might be exactly what they needed to scare off Jonathan.

  “Come. Let’s get to it.” Patricia strode ahead into her office. As Meg and Phillip settled into the leather armchairs that faced Patricia’s massive desk, Meg was awestruck by the view of the Catalina Mountains, which were in-your-face gorgeous in the late-afternoon sun.

  For a moment, Meg was a senior back in high school, driving with Jonathan in his dad’s old Studebaker. I love how Tucson is surrounded by mountains, she’d said. They’re so protective. Jonathan looked over at her like she was crazy. That’s funny, he replied without smiling. I’ve always found them suffocating.

  “So.” Patricia sat forward in her chair and tapped on her desk while looking pointedly at Meg. “Your father tells me that your ex-husband contacted you. What does he want?”

  Meg brought her gaze from the mountains to Patricia’s coldly capable green eyes. She never really trusted people with green eyes. She liked brown eyes. Ahmed eyes. And blue Henry eyes.

  “We think possibly he wants my son.” Meg looked to her father for help.

  “He’s been out of their lives for ten years,” Phillip said. “He’s the father of Meg’s son, Henry, who’s nine, but he’s never been part of his life and has never paid child support.”