by J A Stone
Corey discovered that decorating a tree with Kathryn was unlike any Christmas-tree decorating she’d ever done. First, Kathryn wrapped almost every tree branch in white twinkling lights until it was one huge blaze of white light.
“But I thought the lights went around the tree,” Corey complained as she assisted Kathryn.
Kathryn gave her a disgusted look. “This way the light seems to come from within the tree itself.”
Placing the wide, gold taffeta ribbon on the tree took almost as much time as the lights. The ribbon had to be carefully placed so that it looked like it had just been carelessly thrown on the tree without any thought. When it was finally time for hanging the ornaments, Corey quit.
“I could have decorated three trees by now!” Corey exclaimed in frustration. “I’ve got work to do, and I really don’t care whether the tree has ornaments or not.”
“Fine, I’ll finish it myself. I’d rather do this part alone anyway. You’d probably just put the ornaments on the tree without any thought about placement, and then I’d have to move them.”
When Corey returned to the great room to see the finished product, she had to admit it was a work of art. Still, it was a work of art, she reminded herself grumpily, that would be disassembled and thrown away in a few weeks.
On Monday when Corey got home from work, Kathryn was waiting in her bedroom with an assortment of outfits spread out on the bed. “I knew you didn’t have time to shop.” Kathryn’s eyes sparkled with anticipation.
“I think it’s about time you turned over my house key and MasterCard,” Corey said, unable to keep the excitement out of her voice. She’d been wondering lately what she was going to wear—not just on Thursday night, but to work as well. Most of her clothes were getting tight, and she’d been intending to go shopping. Maybe this is what it’s like to have a personal assistant—or a wife.
“Can’t get them back until I do the baby’s room. I’m already shopping for those pieces right now. Let’s try this black pullover and pants first.”
“Are those maternity pants?”
“Yes . . . can you believe it? You can’t even tell. Not that you really need maternity pants yet, but when they’re this stylish—and you will need them soon—why not?”
Corey ran her hand over her stomach. She supposed it was because she’d been so underweight when she got pregnant, and also because she’d continued to exercise during her pregnancy, but she only had a slight baby bulge even though she was five months pregnant. Yet there had been changes. Her face had lost its gaunt look, and she finally had breasts. Overall, she had probably never looked better in her life.
“This does suit me,” Corey said, standing in front of the floor-length mirror and turning from side to side. “Thanks Kathryn, I don’t know how I survived before I met you.”
“Not very well, I know,” Kathryn informed her with a cheeky smile.
The next decision Corey had to make was where to go for dinner. She wanted Tripp to see the real Atlanta, which could easily be done by walking to Capo’s Café, a neighborhood bistro. But Capo’s had been one of Luke’s favorite restaurants, and one they had frequented almost weekly. Going now with another man whose baby she happened to be carrying seemed wrong on so many levels. Yet the closer it got to Thursday, the more Corey felt like Capo’s would be the best place for them to go. She supposed it was time for her to face her memories of Capo’s as she’d faced so many other memories.
Once all the preparations had been completed, Corey finally had to think about Tripp and what his sudden appearance in her life might mean. What if he suspected something? If so, should she just tell him the truth? And if she did, what would happen next?
After what seemed like a month, Thursday finally arrived. Corey left work a bit early so that she would have plenty of time to get ready. Kathryn stopped by unexpectedly to approve her hair and makeup. It was fun to have someone to discuss the pros and cons of hairstyles with. Did her hair look better pulled back or left loose? In the end, they decided that pulled back looked more elegant, and more appropriate for Corey’s new outfit.
“I feel like I’m going to the prom or something,” Corey laughed. “Actually, I never spent this much time getting ready for any of the proms I went to with Tripp.”
“Oh my gosh, you never told me you went to proms together. This really is serious! Can I stay and meet him?”
“No, you may not.”
“Please?”
“No! I’m not sixteen, and my date doesn’t need to meet my parents. In fact, it’s time you were leaving.” Almost as if on cue, the doorbell rang. It’s only six thirty. Could he be this early?
“I’ll answer the door,” Kathryn said, heading toward the door, “on my way out.”
“Wait!” But it was too late. Kathryn was already opening the door. The good thing about Kathryn opening the door was that Corey was able to observe Tripp for a couple of minutes without his knowing. Her first impression was that his blond hair contrasted very nicely with the dark-brown coat he was wearing, and the confused look on his face was really adorable. He stared at Kathryn blankly, obviously wondering if he was at the wrong address. Here is my baby’s father, Corey thought, and something inside her tightened.
“Hello, Tripp. I’m Kathryn—a friend of Corey’s.” Tripp’s face noticeably relaxed at Kathryn’s words. “I would love to stay and chat with you, but unfortunately I have a prior commitment. Maybe next time.”
Tripp looked beyond her, toward where Corey stood. “Yeah, okay, nice to meet you.”
“You two kids have fun,” Kathryn said breezily as she put on her jacket. Then, with a brief wave, she walked out the door.
Corey walked forward to greet Tripp. “You have any trouble finding the place?”
“Not too much.” They stood in the foyer looking at each other sort of awkwardly.
“Here, let me take your coat.”
He slid out of his coat, then noticed the Christmas tree behind her. “I see you did get a tree the other day.” He walked over to it. “This may be the prettiest Christmas tree I’ve ever seen.” He looked around the room appreciatively. “And what a great place you’ve got. I’d never suspect that a traditional redbrick apartment building on the outside could be so spacious and modern on the inside.”
Corey laughed. “I wish I could take credit for all of it—the condo, the Christmas tree—but my friend Kathryn is a decorator, and all the credit goes to her.”
Tripp turned from the tree to look at Corey, and his eyes stopped obviously at her stomach. Corey felt her face reddening in embarrassment.
“Pregnancy suits you. You look beautiful.”
Corey felt her face flush even more. “Thanks.”
“And very sophisticated,” he added.
“Thanks,” she said again. Suddenly, she was anxious to get out of the condo. “If you’re up for a short walk, I thought we would go to a neighborhood restaurant.”
“Not too cold for you?”
“What are you talking about? This is practically a heat wave,” Corey said.
“Well, then, let’s go. I’m hungry.”
The night couldn’t have been more perfect. The moon was full, and lit up the night like a large overhead street lamp. The unusually mild December temperatures had brought tons of neighborhood people outside. A lady dressed in a very expensive-looking white woolen suit walked in front of them with a very expensive-looking small white dog on a silver leash. When the dog stopped to do its business, Tripp and Corey scooted around them on the sidewalk as a man and woman jogged by them on the street.
“This is a real neighborhood you live in,” Tripp said appreciatively. “I’ve never thought of Atlanta being like this.”
“A lot of people only think about the horrible traffic on the interstates when they think about Atlanta. But there’s a lot more to it than that.”
“Yep, that would have been me.” Tripp grinned at her. “That’s why I’m so early tonight. I wanted to allow a lot of ex
tra time in case I got stuck in traffic.”
Corey smiled back and felt herself relax. It was fun to be the one showing Tripp something for a change. He paused in front of the local hardware store window. “This is like taking a step back in time. I thought the warehouse stores had run these places out of business.” They stopped to window-shop at a bookstore and a pottery shop, and then they were standing in front of the restaurant. The hostess directed them to the bar because their table wasn’t quite ready.
“What’ll it be?” the bartender asked as they approached. There were a couple of guys at the other end of the bar drinking beers and watching a football game on a small television mounted on the wall in the corner.
“You go ahead,” Corey offered as she sat down. “Just because I can’t drink doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t get something.” She noticed that her baby bump was a bit more obvious when she sat down.
“Congratulations, guys,” the bartender said. “When is your baby due?”
Corey felt her face grow warm. They looked like a married couple, she supposed, and she did still have her wedding ring on. “May 10,” she lied. Tripp ordered a beer and then seemed to be thinking hard. Corey could almost picture his mind working, subtracting backward from the date she’d just given.
“I hope you like this place,” she said lightly. “The food is really wonderful, not a lot of fried foods, but I’m sure you can find something you like just as well.”
The hostess told them their table was ready, and they followed her through an almost-empty restaurant to a corner in the back. “Don’t worry,” Corey said as they walked by the empty tables. “The place will fill up in a few minutes. We’re just a bit ahead of the crowd.”
After they were seated, Tripp seemed oddly uncomfortable. He took a sip of his beer and then looked directly into Corey’s eyes. “I had this idea that maybe you’d gotten pregnant at the beach.” His directness took Corey by surprise. Before she could think of how to respond, he continued, “I had to come see you for myself.”
“And what do you see?” Corey asked, in order to stall for time so that she could think about what she wanted to say next. Is it time to tell the truth?
“I see a woman who seems to have it all. You have a fabulous house in a great neighborhood. You have good friends who decorate your Christmas tree for you. And I see a woman who barely looks pregnant at all, and who certainly doesn’t look five months pregnant.”
“Are you relieved?” Corey asked hesitantly.
“I suppose so.”
The sadness Corey had held at bay for almost a week hit her hard once again. What had she expected from him? That he would tell her he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her since their time at the beach? Is that what she really wanted?
“Oh . . . I meant to give this to you at your house. I brought you a Christmas present.” He took a small box out of his coat pocket and set it on the table in front of her. “Go ahead, open it now.”
Corey felt confused as she studied him for a moment and then looked at the small green box wrapped with a red satin ribbon.
“It’s not much, really . . . go on,” Tripp urged.
She opened the wrapping paper slowly and carefully so that she wouldn’t have to look up at Tripp for a few more moments. Finally, when she could stall no longer, she took the top off the box and saw a small piece of wood. She looked up at him curiously.
“I was passing by the Wonder Bar the other day. They were clearing what’s left of the burned building. When I saw part of the old bar out by the road, I had to stop and preserve a piece of our teenage history. I picked up a small piece for each of us.”
Tears suddenly sprouted from her eyes unexpectedly. “I’m sorry,” she said, looking at Tripp’s bemused face. “Pregnancy seems to make me very emotional. I even cry at Hallmark commercials these days. This is great!”
“Well, I’m glad you like your present. Are you hungry? I’m starved. How about we order now?” Tripp picked up the menu and began studying it like a student cramming for an exam.
Corey gathered her emotions while she pretended to study the menu as well. By the time Dylan, their young, blond, buff server, arrived to tell them about the specials, Corey felt back in control. Dylan was the prototypical Atlanta waiter. “Tonight the chef has prepared three extraordinary dishes that aren’t on the menu.” Dylan continued to describe the specials with more superlatives than Corey thought humanly possible. Many of the words he used Corey barely recognized, and she wondered what Tripp was thinking. After Dylan left to give them some time to ponder their many and varied choices, Tripp said, “Did you bring a dictionary? I’m used to simple orders. You know, I’ll have the steak, medium rare. Or, I’ll have the shrimp, fried.”
Corey smiled, wondering why she’d never before noticed how pretentious the servers at Capo’s were. “If you can figure out what to order, I promise you whatever you get will be really good.”
After what seemed like an excruciatingly long time, Dylan came back to take their orders, and Tripp found that he could, after all, order just a plain fillet, cooked medium rare. Once the ordering was complete and Dylan was gone, Tripp seemed thoughtful, and then hesitantly said, “I don’t want to upset you again, but I really want to know what made you decide to become a single mother.”
Corey fiddled with her napkin nervously. “Luke and I had been trying to have a baby before he got sick,” she said, deciding to, at least, start out honestly. “And, you know, I’m not getting any younger.”
“Yeah, thirty-three in March, I know.”
Of course he would know. His birthday was in April. How many times had she reminded him that for one month, he was only one year older than she was? How ironic would it be if she had the baby on his birthday?
“Weren’t you afraid? This is a really big step to take on your own.”
“I was, and still am, afraid. But I’m mostly happy. And I’ve already contacted this highly recommended nanny service for help after the baby comes.”
Tripp didn’t say anything for a few minutes. He was uncharacteristically serious when he said, “I don’t want to be an old man trying to teach my son to play baseball. And my mother’s condition is making my dad’s health go downhill fast. I’d like for him to see a grandchild before he dies.” Corey felt a pang of guilt stab at her. How could she deny him his rights to this child?
Dylan arrived with their salads, effectively breaking up their intense moment. For the remainder of dinner, they both made a concerted effort to keep the conversation casual. Tripp caught her up on the local gossip, and she told him about an interesting case she had going on at work. When they left Capo’s to head back to her condo, the temperature seemed to have dropped a few degrees, or maybe it was just from leaving the warm confines of the restaurant. “Brr,” Corey said with a smile. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to take back what I said about the heat wave.”
“Here, let me warm you up,” Tripp offered, pulling her into his coat in a bear hug and rubbing her back roughly to create some heat. He could have skipped the rubbing. As soon as he pulled her next to him, Corey felt her temperature go up several degrees. Oddly, he still had that outdoor smell she remembered so vividly from last summer, which instantaneously brought memories of that night rushing back to her.
“Thanks,” she said, pulling away quickly. “I’m fine now.” They walked along for a while in silence.
“You know, Corey, sometimes I think about that night,” Tripp began. It was almost as if he’d been reading her mind. “And I wonder what might have happened if you had stayed the rest of the night, if we had gone fishing that next Saturday, if we had spent some more time together.”
Corey’s heart started racing while she waited to see what he would say next.
“I mean, it would have been nice to have given it a chance to see where it might have gone.” Corey felt her heart speed up a notch more. “But coming here makes me realize you were right about us. You are a different person than the
one I grew up with. You are so much smarter and more sophisticated than I am. I wasn’t around you long enough at the beach to see it. You’ve got it all here. You’re living the life you were meant to live, and I’m really happy for you.”
Corey felt her eyes fill with tears. They were almost back to her condo, and she needed to do something that would keep the tears at bay. “Yeah,” she said in her best Humphrey Bogart imitation, “but we’ll always have Mexico Beach, right?”
Tripp looked confused and perhaps a little hurt. “I guess I better head on now. Take care of yourself and that baby.”
“Thanks,” Corey said sadly. “You too.” She stood in the open doorway feeling thoughtless and cruel. He’d been baring his soul to her, and she’d been plagiarizing lines from Casablanca. She stood there long after the taillights of his car were out of sight. Why were things always so complicated between the two of them?
CHAPTER 12
Kathryn called while Corey was on her way to work the next morning, but she didn’t answer the phone. Unable to sleep, Corey had already rehashed the night plenty of times in her mind. Should she have told him the truth? Well, she hadn’t, and it was too late now, and she didn’t feel like going through it all one more time with Kathryn.
As usual, she took solace in her work, and in spite of everything, the day passed rather quickly. When Corey got home, she wasn’t surprised to see Kathryn curled up on the sofa watching television.
“I’m dying to know. Tell me every little detail,” Kathryn said, sitting up on the sofa as Corey walked in.
“Not much to tell. We had a nice dinner.”
“Oh come on, and afterward? Did he stay the night?”
“No, he didn’t even come in after dinner.”
“Mmm, that’s not good. So what happened at dinner?”
“Nothing happened. He’s an old friend who was in town. We had dinner, period, the end.”
