by Billie Green
Standing up straighter, he looked directly at her. With deepening pain she saw that there was no emotion in his eyes at all.
"You think you're a loser?" he said quietly. "Well, you're right. You want a baby without the challenge of marriage and you want a lover without the commitment of love."
He turned away and walked to the front door. When his hand was on the knob, he paused, but didn't look back at her. "Count me out, Sara. I don't work that way. Forget the partnership. Forget our friendship. Forget everything."
She took a faltering step toward him. It wasn't supposed to be this way. He had misunderstood everything.
"You can't mean it," she whispered. "You wouldn't really just walk out."
He sagged slightly, and she wondered desperately what words she should have used, what things she could have said to keep him there.
"Watch me," he said hoarsely, and then Charlie was gone.
Sara stood as though turned to stone until she heard his car gunning through the snow. Then she realized there were tears on her face. She stumbled toward a chair, but instead slumped down on the rumpled sleeping bag, clutching a pillow to her breasts as she rocked back and forth.
She had thought she felt empty when the baby had left, but that pain was nothing compared to what she experienced now. No more Charlie, she repeated over and over as the silent, endless tears fell. Oh, God, how could she live with no more Charlie in her life?
❧
It was late in the day before Sara managed to pull herself together and think calmly. She went over everything she and Charlie had said—every word, every nuance—trying to get things straight in her mind.
He was wrong, she told herself. He had to be. She couldn't have spent years fighting a shadow of her own making. It just wasn't possible.
He had said she had had more than her share of successes. She knew he was right, but there were reasons for all of them. She never would have gotten into the prestigious college she had attended if her father hadn't had a friend on the board. And the award she had received the year before—it had been an empty honor. They had chosen her because it was her turn. Every other businesswoman in Billings had been honored at some point or another. They simply had needed a fresh face.
And all her sales. She had worked long and hard for those sales, twice as hard as any other real-estate agent. How could she consider those sales successes, when it took so much of her energy to accomplish what others did easily?
Her parents were perhaps her biggest failure of all. They hadn't spoken to her since she had chosen real estate over a law degree. They thought she was throwing away her ability. They couldn't realize that—
She stopped her thoughts abruptly. How did she know they couldn't understand? When had she ever tried to explain her feelings to them? Was it possible that their misunderstanding was her own fault?
The idea was too earth-shaking for her to take in, for a minute. Closing her eyes, she tried to relax and open her mind to this new possibility. She had always regretted that she couldn't be honest with her parents about her shortcomings, but who said she couldn't be? Why had she never sat down with them and said, "Look, this is the way I feel"? What would they have said if she had told them that all her life she had felt she failed to earn their love?
Okay, she admitted silently, maybe Charlie had been right about some things, but that didn't automatically make everything all right.
As she sat huddled on the floor something began to nag at her, something Charlie had said. He had said that she was doing a lot of intelligent people an injustice by thinking she was fooling them.
Suddenly she sat up straighter. Her father's friend on the college board. Sara had known him well; his family had been friends with hers. He was a decent, intelligent man. Would he really have pulled strings to get her into college?
Once the idea was formulated, Sara was shocked at what she had been doing. She had been minimizing the moral character and intelligence of many people in her past. Why did she see it so clearly now?
Because of Charlie.
The answer came unbidden, and brought with it the problem she had been avoiding since he had walked out her door. Charlie had been right about everything, she realized as tears began forming again. She had sounded exactly like the sniveling coward she was. She had been so wrapped up in her own inadequacies that they had taken over her life. Why hadn't she ever hauled her fears out to look at them? She was deeply ashamed now to think of how desperately she had tried to hide from herself. She couldn't blame Charlie for walking out on her. She didn't deserve him.
The tears stopped abruptly, and her eyes opened wide when she realized what was happening. She was practically reveling in another failure. But it wasn't just another failure. This was the one that would destroy her.
"No, not again," she said aloud, her chin firm.
She wouldn't allow herself to fall into the same trap. She refused simply to give up without a fight, as she had always done before. Charlie was too important to lose. Charlie was life itself. If she let him walk out on her now, there would be nothing but emptiness in the future.
All night she sat in front of the fire, thinking, planning what she would do. Confidence didn't come automatically. The fear of losing had been a part of her for too long. It would be quite a while before she could let go of the shadows that had ruled her life in the past.
She was still desperately afraid of what would happen when she confronted Charlie. But this time the fear was different. This time she faced it and accepted it and went on. Maybe she would always be afraid, but she would never choose the fear over Charlie.
❧
The next morning when the electricity came back on, Sara took care of relighting the central heat and the water heater. As she bathed and dressed she moved with purpose. One way or another she would make Charlie listen. If there were any way to undo what she had done, she would grab it.
Irma called at about nine to add her thanks to Harmen's for keeping Dawn safe. The older wnman sounded tired but relieved when she told Sara that the specialist from Houston had pinpointed Marilyn's problem. The viral disease had an unpronounceable name but was definitely curable.
Sara was pleased for Irma's sake and for Dawn's, but she had an errand to run, and everything took a back seat to the resolution of her problems with Charlie.
As soon as she hung up the phone, she grabbed her purse and left the house. She had a gift to buy—an important gift—then she would find Charlie.
Two hours later, on the long, slow drive home, she found herself glancing continually at the package on the seat, knowing it wouldn't make everything right again, but hoping against hope that it would provide the opening she needed.
When she pulled into the driveway she saw Charlie's car parked by the back door. Her heart jerked as she stared at the red convertible.
Please, God, she asked silently. Please let me make him understand. She took deep, slow breaths to calm herself, then got out of the car.
Inside the house she paused at the door to Charlie's office. He was sitting at his desk, his hands bracing his head, as though he also had spent a sleepless night. Then, as if sensing her presence, he raised his head and stared at her.
Was there really so much pain in his eyes, she wondered, or was she imagining it? Her lips trembled into a tentative smile. "Hi," she said softly.
When he didn't respond, she walked into the room. "I—I bought you a present." She held out the wrapped box.
He stared at her for a moment longer, then glanced at the box in her hands. Without speaking, he took it from her and opened it.
Sara held her breath as he pulled the long white silk scarf from the box. With his head bent he said, "What does it mean, Sara? Does it mean you want me to be Charlie Just-for-fun?"
She swallowed a sob. "It means I want you to be Charlie Everything. My Everything. At least as much as I can have . . . the fun side and the serious side. Friend, partner . . . lover."
His fingers clenc
hed tightly around the white silk, and he brought the scarf to his face, his eyes closed. "Does this mean you're not afraid anymore?"
"I'm terrified, Charlie," she said shakily. "But as scared as I am of what could happen between us, I'm even more terrified of being without you."
He stood, and slowly began walking toward her. "Terrified enough to take the next step?"
She moistened her lips nervously. She didn't understand what he meant, but she couldn't blow it now. "The next step?" she repeated hoarsely.
"Friend, partner, lover—yes, all those. But what about husband, Sara?"
She paled. "You want me . . . You want to get married? You can't really want that, Charlie." She shook her head frantically. "You walked out on me. You were going to leave me forever. . . . Weren't you?"
"I'm almost tempted to lie." His tone mocked himself. "But I can't. The truth is, I would have stayed. I've sweated it out for two years, and I guess I would have sweated it out for another forty or so if I had to." He smiled that crazy crooked smile. "I'm afraid loving you is a habit I can't break."
Sara felt a wave of dizziness hit her. She closed her eyes tightly. "You love me?"
At last he reached her, and she was in his arms. "Love you?" he said hoarsely against her hair. "I've almost gone crazy with loving you. I think I must have fallen in love the first time I saw you." He held her so tightly, it hurt. But this pain was miraculously welcome. "I've wanted to tell you so many times, Sara. You just can't know. But the picture of your reaction always stopped me. I figured you would split your sides laughing."
"Never," she said, clutching him feverishly. "I never would have laughed at you. I love you too much for that."
He inhaled sharply. Then, framing her face, he pulled her head gently away from his shoulder so he could look at her. He didn't speak; he didn't question. He merely searched her face for answers, and when he found them at last there were tears in his blue eyes.
❧
It was much, much later before they found time to really talk, but a more important kind of communication took place between them.
The sun was dropping in the west when Charlie leaned on one elbow to look down at her, lying on the bed beside him. "It's really happening, isn't it?" He sounded as deeply satisfied as Sara felt.
She touched his face. "I still might screw it up, Charlie. I might screw it up badly."
He kissed her hand. "Shut up," he said lazily. "We can do whatever we want. So if it gets screwed up, it will be because we both did it. But it won't. We won't let it." He frowned. "I don't want you to think I don't understand what's been happening to you, Sara. I blame myself for some of it. I should have seen it; I should have helped you. We all have things that eat at us—I'll tell you about some of mine later. From now on I'll share your fear with you. You won't have to face it alone ever again."
She closed her eyes as pure happiness flowed through her. She knew it would be up to her to change her outlook, but with Charlie beside her anything was possible. "That sounds wonderful. . . . You're wonderful."
"I've always known that," he said, smiling a smile that made the sun pale. "But I've had a hell of a time bringing you around to my way of thinking."
She laughed, and pulled his head down to kiss him. After a moment she dropped her gaze and, playing with the hair on his chest, said, "Charlie, there's just one thing."
"Ummm?"
"If you've loved me all this time, what were all those women for?"
He raised one brow in haughty inquiry.
"Okay," she admitted, her voice disgruntled. "I know what they were for."
He ran his hands down her back, then cupped her buttocks and pulled her closer. "No, you don't. All those women were a desperate attempt to get you out of my mind and out of my heart. They didn't work. I even tried to get involved a couple of times, especially after you started seeing Alston. But I couldn't. You see"—he laid his hand gently against her face—"none of them was Sara, my Love. I'm afraid I've always had my heart set on you, kid. No one else would do."
His eyes were shining brightly with an emotion she had no trouble recognizing as love. "This is just the beginning, Sara," he said, his exhilaration spreading to her, running wildly through her blood. "We're on our way to forever."
