The Inheritance

by Rochelle Alers

  Hannah, following St. John’s strong lead, made certain to keep her spine straight and her left hand placed midway along his right arm without actually holding on to it, finding the steps passionate and precise. Two hours after they walked into the studio the lesson ended, and she applauded along with the others. Sitting on the bench, she slipped out of the dance shoes and massaged her left calf.

  “Let me do that,” St. John said, gently pushing Hannah’s hands away. Resting her leg over his thigh, he kneaded the tight muscles in her leg.

  “Oh-o-o-o. That feels good.”

  “Do you have anything planned tonight?”

  “No. Why?”

  “I have the perfect remedy for leg cramps.”

  “I hope it’s not some foul-smelling ointment.”

  Lowering her leg, he pushed his feet into a pair of running shoes. “It’s something I’m certain you’ll enjoy.”

  “Can you at least give me a hint?”

  After waiting until Hannah changed her shoes, he held her hand and led her to the street. St. John wanted to tell Hannah that he wasn’t ready to take her home, that of all of his dance partners, he’d felt her the most accomplished.

  “I’m going to drop you back at your house so you can get a change of clothes. Then we’re going to my house where you can soak in the Jacuzzi before relaxing in the steam room.”

  “What are you going to do while I’m taking advantage of your health spa?” she teased.

  He winked at her. “I’ll be making dinner for my favorite dance partner.”

  Hannah’s smile was dazzling. “I like the sound of that.”

  St. John started up the car. This was the Hannah he remembered. They’d always enjoyed an easygoing camaraderie. They would meet at her home or the local library to study or work on a project. And he’d kissed her to prove he didn’t mind being seen with her.

  Everyone had believed he and Lorna had the perfect marriage, while behind closed doors there was no marriage; not when his wife refused to let him make love to her. He’d lain beside the same woman for thirty-two years and each time he attempted to touch her she cried.

  After the first year he gave up and looked elsewhere to slake his pent-up frustration. The first time he slept with another woman, the guilt nearly swallowed him whole. He went to confession for the first time since before his marriage. The priest reminded him that he’d committed adultery and therefore had broken one of the ten commandments. St. John left the church and never went back. It was easier the second time he slept with a woman who wasn’t his wife, and after his third encounter he’d absolved himself of his own guilt.

  He had to admit Lorna played the game well whenever she accompanied him to social events, morphing into her role as the affectionate, adoring wife, but the pretense ended the instant they walked through the door of their home.

  Well, he and Hannah didn’t have to play a game, because they were friends, and once the summer ended, their friendship would be placed on hold until their next reunion.

  Chapter 10

  Hannah glanced up at St. John’s Marigny residence, not knowing what to expect, but it wasn’t the brick Southern-style farmhouse. Twin fans were suspended from the ceiling of the second-story veranda, and the portico light fixture matched the two lanterns suspended from stanchions flanking the towering oaks trees shading the front.

  “Your house is magnificent.”

  Cupping her elbow, St. John led her up the porch. “Thank you, but I can’t take credit for the house or anything in it because the accolades go to my aunt.” He unlocked the front door. “I’d thought about selling this house and moving into a smaller one, but changed my mind once I got used to the spaciousness.”

  Hannah hoisted the tote with a change of clothes and an ample supply of grooming aids over her shoulder. “How big is it?”

  “It’s close to three thousand square feet, which includes the outdoor kitchen.”

  “Did she put in the kitchen?”

  St. John opened the door, stepping aside to let her enter. “No. It was included in the house’s original design plans. A Pennsylvania mine owner commissioned it to be built as a winter residence for his family.”

  “When was that?” Hannah asked.

  “It was several years after the Spanish-American War. After a number of strikes which ended in violence, he sold the mine and moved here permanently. He left the property to a grandson who unfortunately had an addiction to gambling and eventually lost it in a poker game. My aunt bought it from a couple who couldn’t afford to pay for the upkeep. She updated the interiors, installed central heating and air, and refurbished the exterior and garden.”

  Hannah’s gaze took in the narrow bookcase situated against the wall in the entry and a low-slung leather chair by the door under the sidelight so as not to block the sun. A mahogany console table cradling potted ivy plants matched the banister and newel posts on the curving staircase leading to the upper floor. The paleness of bleached oak flooring in a herringbone design was repeated on walls in the living and formal dining rooms, creating a continuous palette of barely-there color. A gleaming black baby grand piano drew her attention and reminded her that St. John had played piano in the school’s jazz band.

  Reaching for her hand, St. John led her down a hallway to the rear of the house. “There were three large bedrooms on this floor I knew I’d never use, so I converted one into an office and the other to an in-home gym because I never had the time to drive downtown every morning to work out. Although I have a treadmill, I prefer running outdoors. The last one, which had been the maids’ quarters, became a sunroom.” He stopped at the entrance to the gym. “It’s all yours. I’m going upstairs to shower and change before I start dinner.”

  The in-home gym contained everything Hannah would find at an upscale health club. Hand weights in various sizes and colors were stacked on a rack against a far wall. A wall-mounted television was positioned for viewing for anyone working out on the treadmill, rowing machine, or bike. There was also a heavy bag and several pairs of boxing gloves hanging from wall hooks.

  Setting the tote on a teakwood bench, she walked over to the door labeled “Bath” and opened it. Frosted glass walls let light in, while providing complete privacy from the outside. An enormous black sunken tub with enough room for two was the space’s centerpiece. A free-standing shower occupied an entire corner, while the doors to an ultra-modern steam room stood open, beckoning her to come and sweat out her body’s impurities. She gathered a towel from an ample supply on a glass-topped, wrought-iron table, placing it on the stool next to the tub.

  Hannah turned on the water, adding several capfuls of lavender bath salts. Within minutes the space was filled with the alluring fragrance. Stripping off her clothes, she settled down into the warm water. Closing her eyes, she felt herself succumbing to the sensation of water pulsating against her body. The leisurely soak ended once the water cooled.

  Stepping out onto a thick chenille mat, she wrapped the towel around her body and padded barefoot into the steam room. Hannah programmed the thermostat for twenty minutes at ninety degrees, and then lay down to savor the moist heat. A shower followed, where she shampooed her hair and wrapped it in a towel to absorb most of the moisture. It was on a rare occasion that she used a blow dryer because the heat tended to make the strands brittle and flyaway.

  An hour after entering the spa, Hannah emerged dressed in a pair of slim-fitting cropped jeans, a man-tailored white shirt, and white deck shoes. She heard music and, following the sound, she found herself at the entrance to the kitchen. St. John stood at the cooking island, chopping herbs with the skill of a professional chef. He’d changed into a sand-colored short-sleeved seersucker shirt, khaki walking shorts, and leather sandals. Without warning, his head popped up and he smiled at her.

  “How do you feel?”

  She walked into the ultra-modern kitchen with granite countertops, stainless-steel appliances, and a collection of copper-bottom pots suspended from a rack
over a commercial cooktop range and grill. It was apparent St. John was quite comfortable in the kitchen, and she wondered if he, like the owners of Chez Toussaints, was skilled in the art of preparing authentic New Orleans dishes.

  “Like a new woman. Would you like some help?”

  St. John washed his hands in one of the twin sinks, then dried them on the towel he’d thrown over one shoulder. “No, thanks. I have everything under control. Sit down and relax. It’s going to be at least twenty minutes before we can eat. Meanwhile, I’ll get you something to drink.”

  Her eyes followed him as he made his way to the built-in refrigerator and took out a pitcher filled with lemon and lime slices in a yellowish bubbly liquid, marveling that St. John had the physique of a man half his age. She sat on one of the three stools at the cooking island. “What’s on tonight’s menu?”

  St. John filled a glass from the pitcher, handing it to her. “I usually try to keep to meatless Mondays, so I decided we’d start with a peach and shrimp ceviche as an appetizer, and follow that with an entrée of Louisiana blue crab–stuffed flounder in a lemon butter sauce with a side of apple-jicama slaw.”

  St. John didn’t know that he’d just gone up several more points on her list of criteria for the perfect man; she was always impressed with men who were able to cook. Unfortunately, her late husband was completely helpless in the kitchen. “That sounds delicious. Do you have a particular menu for the other days of the week?”

  He nodded. “For Taco Tuesdays I usually make them with fish instead of beef. Wednesday is wing night. They can be turkey, buffalo, Thai, jerk, or Korean, as long as they are wings.”

  Hannah swallowed a mouthful of the icy cold carbonated citrus drink. “What about Thursdays?”

  “Thursdays is soup night with a side salad.”

  “What types of soups do you make?”

  “Lentil with andouille, split pea or white bean with tasso, and occasionally I’ll whip up a pot of gumbo. I always make too much, so I end up freezing the leftovers in single-serve containers. Fridays and the weekends are toss-ups because I usually eat whatever I’m craving on those days. It can vary from boudin balls to grilled oysters or shrimp and grits.”

  Smiling, she closed her eyes for several seconds. “You’re singing my song. You just named all of my favorites. Did your mother teach you to cook?”

  St. John shook his head as he carefully cut a radish into paper-thin slices, adding them to a wooden bowl filled with shredded green cabbage and thinly sliced jicama. “No. It was my grandmother. The hospital where my mother worked as a nurse was always short-staffed, which meant her shift changed every three months. My dad always patrolled the most crime-ridden neighborhoods in the city, so whenever both my parents worked nights, me and my sister stayed with my grandmother. Once Grandma’s arthritis made it difficult for her to pick up a cast iron frying pan or a carry a Dutch oven, she’d sit on a stool and instruct me step-by-step how to prepare dishes that had been passed down from generations of women who perfected their recipes. Designated days are totally forgotten whenever I’m on vacation, because I eat out or order in several days a week. That’s when I tend to overeat, which means I have to work out twice as long as I normally would.”

  “It doesn’t show, because you’re in incredible shape.”

  He glanced up at her. “Speak for yourself, Hannah. A lot of the women at the reunion were giving you the stink-eye when you walked in.”

  She set down the glass. “If they were giving me the stink-eye, it isn’t because of how I look. They’ve always resented me because they felt I didn’t belong, that I should’ve stayed at McGehee with the other snobby rich bitches.”

  “Why did you transfer to Jackson Memorial?”

  Hannah mentally struggled how she was going to reveal to St. John something that had haunted her for years and how it changed how she viewed those in the social circle into which she’d been born. “I was fifteen when I was invited to a sleepover. The girl who hosted the sleepover decided to entertain us with photographs her Ku Kluxer grandfather had taken of black men who’d been tortured before they were lynched. Some of the photos were so graphic that I ran into the bathroom and vomited while my so-called classmates laughed and taunted me for weeks. That’s when I told my mother I was never going back to McGehee. She tried to convince me the school wasn’t at fault, but a bunch of silly girls who were only repeating what they’d heard from their parents.

  “It was the first time I challenged my mother. I told her I really didn’t give a damn if the girls were parroting their bigoted parents, which caused her to go into histrionics, threatening to take a switch to my behind, when Daddy intervened. He reassured me I didn’t have to return to McGehee, and I could either attend a public or a local parochial high school. I chose Jackson Memorial, and the first day Daddy’s driver dropped me off in front the school everyone stopped talking to stare at me. It was so quiet you could hear a rat piss on cotton.”

  St. John burst into laughter, then stopped abruptly when her eyes filled moisture. “I’m sorry about laughing but—”

  “Don’t apologize,” Hannah said, cutting him off. She wanted to cry, but refused to let St. John see her that way. It took a several minutes for her to regain her composure. “If the situation hadn’t been so tense, I know I would’ve laughed. I’d left a private school where girls still carried racial bigotry from past generations to go to a public school where girls carried a different kind of prejudice that had nothing to do with race but social class. They called me every name imaginable, but I never let on how much I cried inside. I don’t think I’d be the person I am today if I hadn’t gone through the taunts and alienation, because I learned to love myself more than seeking someone’s acceptance or approval.”

  A beat passed, and then St. John said, “I’m sorry you had to go through that. I just thought they were jealous of you.”

  “Jealous or not, I got over it a long time ago.” Her somber expression changed like a snake shedding its skin as a sense of strength replaced the memories of what she’d had to endure while in high school. She took another swallow of the slightly sweet and tart icy concoction. “This is delicious. How did you make it?”

  “I substituted club soda for water and agave for sugar. And because you’re not much of a drinker I decided to make a fizzy lemon-limeade rather than offer you anything alcoholic that will probably have you fall asleep on me.”

  “I suppose you’ll never let me live that down.”

  St. John came around the countertop and kissed her damp hair. “I’m not picking on you, sweetheart. I want you to know that whenever we’re together, I’ll make certain to take care of you.”

  Turning her head, their noses only inches apart, she stared deeply into his eyes, wondering if St. John calling her sweetheart was a slip of the tongue and whether she actually wanted or needed him to take care of her when she’d been taking care of herself for years. As a military wife, she took care of herself and her son whenever Robert was deployed or on maneuvers. She’d continued to take care of herself even when Robert commuted between New York and D.C., but after he had his first heart attack she’d become his caretaker, monitoring his diet and reminding him to exercise. Hannah had become a caretaker who couldn’t bring herself to resume sexual relations with her husband after he was medically cleared by his cardiologist.

  Hannah knew she couldn’t come down hard on St. John because he’d been raised in the Southern tradition to protect women. He hadn’t hesitated to intervene when Matt Johnston had come on too strong. Maybe it was time she let a man take care of her.

  “Thank you for offering.”

  Cradling her face in his hands, he pressed his forehead to hers. “I should be the one thanking you.”

  “For what?” she whispered.

  “For reminding me why I’ve always liked you.”

  With wide eyes, Hannah stared at St. John as if she’d never seen him before. What was he talking about? He’d never said he liked her. Yes,
they were classmates and friends, but nothing beyond that.

  “And I’ve always liked you . . . as a friend,” she added quickly.

  * * *

  St. John’s expression did not change. When he’d confessed to Hannah that he liked her, it wasn’t the same as when they were teenagers sharing classes. He hadn’t slept with so many women that he couldn’t remember their names or faces, but as a man quickly approaching sixty he’d come to know St. John Baptiste McNair quite well. He knew he’d wasted too many years in a sterile marriage he should’ve annulled within the first year.

  He’d always told himself that he was drawn to a certain type, without being able to verbalize what type of woman that was. However, there was something about Hannah that had drawn him to her when both were young adults. Only now as mature, middle-aged adults, he recognized it as her quiet inner strength. He’d observed and overheard the cutting looks and snide remarks directed at her by their female classmates, and not once did she attempt to retaliate either verbally or physically.

  During those times St. John wanted to tell Hannah the girls were jealous of her beauty, intelligence, and privileged upbringing. And there were occasions when he suspected she downplayed her intellect, but loathed calling her on it because he knew she’d wanted to fit in with the sons and daughters of poor and working-class parents.

  He’d kissed her in the car because unconsciously it was something he’d wanted to do in the hotel parking lot. Dancing with Hannah while listening to Barry Manilow crooning “When Will I See You Again?” echoed his own yearnings as to when he would see her again. He had insisted on dining at a restaurant rather at her home to ascertain whether he wanted to reconnect with Hannah because he craved an open relationship with a woman that had nothing to do with sex.

  Holding his head at an angle, St. John continued to stare at Hannah, wondering what it was she was thinking or feeling as she met his eyes. “Are you free this weekend to go with me to listen to jazz?”