“I never said it wouldn’t work. I said there are obstacles.”
“Life is full of obstacles. They’re there to be surmounted.”
She digested this piece of wisdom, the kind that usually came from her mouth. His warm palms worked at persuading her. Lord, how good it felt to lie like this with him, to feel him growing aroused against her. How easy it would be to say yes and enjoy this luxury every morning for the rest of her life. She had awakened alone for so many, many years. This was how men and women were meant to be, together. She imagined telling her mother she was going to marry him, then pushed the idea away because it interfered with the pleasure brought by his hands, his scent, his warmth and the sexuality he was stirring within them both.
“So, tell me something,” he said, drawing back, finding her eyes. “If all the extraneous issues didn’t exist—not the age difference, not Janice’s crush, not all the public opinion we’ll have to stand up to— if it were just you and me, knowing me the way you do now, loving me and knowing I love you . . . would you marry me?”
She looked into his beloved blue eyes and answered the way her heart dictated.
“Yes,” she said without pause. “Yes, I would . . . but, Christopher, life isn’t that ea—”
He laid a finger across her lips.
“There . . . you’ve said it. Yes, you’d marry me. You want to. Concentrate on that for a while—will you?—instead of examining the negative side of everything?”
They hugged full-length again, her smooth legs between his coarse-haired ones. “Oh, Christopher,” she sighed—how many times had she sighed his name this morning? “I wish I could just say yes and it would be as simple as that.”
“There was a spell a while back—we didn’t talk about it, but I know what you were thinking. That maybe you had turned to me out of nothing more than desperation, just trying to get over losing Greg. I hope that’s gone by now.”
“It is . . . and I’m sorry I get those spells.”
“Quit reading those books,” he said. “They put ideas into your head. We’re together because we love each other, not because we’re leaning on each other out of desperation, right?”
She drew back to see his face. “Right,” she whispered, “because we love each other.”
He said it again, straight out, holding her face in both hands. “Marry me, Lee.”
She closed her eyes and kissed him to give herself time to reason, but when she was under his naked influence, reason came with much more difficulty. He was fully aroused now, their legs were dovetailed tightly, and every sense within her responded to him.
“No fair,” she whispered against his lips, “asking me when we’re in a state like this.”
“Marry me.” They carried on this dialog between plucking kisses.
“May I have some time to think about it?”
“How much?”
“A day, a week, maybe just long enough to get rid of this enormous lump of morning insistence beneath the covers. I don’t know how long, Christopher. I wish I did, but I don’t.”
“But do you love me?”
“Yes.”
“Will you keep thinking about that while you’re deciding?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to talk to anybody about it?”
“Probably not.”
“Good, because I know a few of them who would try to talk you out of it.”
“So do I.”
Giving up the playfulness, rolling her full length beneath him, he declared with true passion, “Oh, God, I love you. Please say yes.”
“I love you, too, and I’ll try.”
17
NEAR eight o’clock that morning they arose and showered. Lee used the bathroom first, got dressed and was looking into his refrigerator when he came out into the kitchen toweling his hair, wearing gray sweatpants that hung low on his belly. “I want to cook you breakfast to celebrate our first night together, but there’s nothing in here to cook.”
He stood beside her searching the refrigerator, smelling like fresh shampoo and soap.
“Sorry, babe. I usually go out.”
“Want to go to my house and eat? I’ve got lots of good things to put in an omelette. Joey won’t be home yet, so it should be safe for you to take me home.”
“Your house it is,” he agreed, and went off to get dressed. They drove separate cars and arrived at her house shortly before 9 A.M. When Lee pulled into the driveway her blood took a leap to her face: Janice’s car was parked in front of the garage. Lee sat staring at it, gripping the steering wheel, holding her breath, then letting it gush out in resignation. Christopher parked behind her and walked past her window on his way to the garage. He raised the door and, when she’d driven inside, was waiting to open her car door. They stood in the cold garage gazing first at Janice’s car, then at each other.
“Well, this is it, I guess,” he said.
“I had no idea she was coming home.”
“She didn’t call and tell you?”
“No.”
“So what are you going to tell her?”
“We could tell her we’ve been to church.”
“In our blue jeans?”
“You’re right. Besides, I always go to the ten o’clock service. I wonder when she got here.”
“Judging from the frost on her windshield she’s been here all night.”
“I hope nothing’s wrong. I’d better get inside and see.”
When she turned away, he grabbed her arm. “Lee, I want to go in with you.”
“She’s going to be very angry.”
“I can handle that.”
“Embarrassed, too.”
“I want us to face her together. Anything you’re guilty of, I’m guilty of. Besides, if she’s up she probably saw us both drive in, and I don’t want it to look like I’m slinking off and leaving you to explain.”
They went in together through the front door. Janice was standing by the kitchen table holding an ice pack on her jaw, glaring at them.
“Janice, what’s wrong?” Lee moved straight toward her without stopping to remove her jacket.
“Nothing!” Janice snapped, her mouth cinching tight.
“What’s wrong with your jaw?”
“A wisdom tooth. Where have you been, as if it isn’t obvious!”
Lee removed her jacket and hung it on a chair. “At Chris’s.”
“All night? Mother, how could you?” Janice’s face was flaming. She refused to look at Christopher.
“I’m sorry you found out this way.”
“Where’s Joey?”
“He spent the night at the Holiday Inn with the Whitmans.”
“Does he know about what’s been going on?”
“No.”
“Oh my God, I can’t believe this.” Janice covered her face with one hand and turned away.
Christopher stood behind Lee’s shoulder without touching her. “Your mom and I discussed whether or not to tell you but she decided she needed a little longer to sort out her feelings.”
“Her feelings! Hers!” She spun on him. “What about mine? What about Joey’s? This is disgusting!”
“Why?” he asked calmly.
“I’m not ignorant!” Janice snapped. “A woman doesn’t stay out all night at a man’s apartment without sex being involved. It is, isn’t it?”
Lee snapped, “Janice, you’re being rude.”
Christopher remained calm. “Your mother and I have been seeing each other a lot since last June.”
“Since my brother died! Say it the way it is! That’s what started all this, isn’t it? The classic mourning woman turns to the younger man for sympathy.”
“I turned to her, too.”
“Well, you could have told me! You could have . . . have said something before I . . . before I . . .” Mortifled, she escaped to the working part of the kitchen, turning her back on them once more. Christopher brushed around Lee’s shoulder and took Janice’s arm to gently tur
n her around.
“Things were complicated, Janice,” he said quietly. She averted her burning face, refusing to look at him. “You know why.” He released her arm.
She said to the floor, “I must have looked like a fool, giving you those tickets for Christmas, saying the stuff I did.”
“No. I was the one in the wrong. I should have told you long before that, that I had feelings for your mom.”
She glared up at him. “Then why didn’t you?”
“Because we were no different than anyone else when we started dating. We didn’t know what it would lead to.”
Too embarrassed to stand so close to him, Janice shouldered around both him and Lee and stood defiantly at the opening where the hall led toward the bedrooms.
“Mother, he’s thirty years old, for heaven’s sake! What are people going to say?”
“Exactly what you are, I suppose. That he’s too young for me. So should I give him up because I’ll upset people?”
“You should give him up because you’ll look like a fool!”
Lee felt herself begin to grow angry. “Do you think so, Janice? Why?”
Janice glared from her mother to Christopher and back again, her mouth clamped tightly shut.
“Why will I look like a fool, Janice? Because this is a sexual relationship?” Christopher opened his mouth to speak, but she held up a hand. “No, it’s all right, Christopher. She’s twenty-three years old; she’s old enough to hear the truth. You’re angry with me right now, Janice; well, I’m angry with you, too, because you’re implying that because there’s fifteen years difference between Christopher and me, he’s using me. Do I have that correct?”
Janice blushed brighter and looked at the floor.
“Is that the kind of person you think Christopher is?”
Janice was too mortifled to speak.
“You might as well know that it’s been a big issue between us, one that we’ve talked about. Only it isn’t only whether or not Christopher is using me, but whether I’m using him to get over Greg’s death. I’m not. I love him. I’m sorry if that doesn’t fit into your image of how a mother should act, but I do have feelings, I do have needs and I do get lonely. I even think about my future. I’m not old, Janice, I’m only older than Christopher, but who’s to say how old is too old? Must I get permission from my family before I date a man?”
Janice looked up miserably. Tears shimmered on her eyelids. “But, Mother, he’s Greg’s friend. He’s . . . he’s more like your son.”
“No. That’s your viewpoint, not mine. Our relationship has totally changed in the last eight months. You might be interested to know that we became very, very good friends first before our relationship became intimate.”
A hint of challenge came into Janice’s voice when she asked, “What’s Grandma going to say?”
Lee resisted the urge to look to Christopher for help. “Grandma will be very outspoken, and it won’t be pleasant, but Grandma doesn’t run my life. I do.”
“Well, I can see that nothing I say is going to make you change your mind, so I’m going to bed. I’ve been up half the night waiting for you and my tooth hurts like the devil.”
“Why didn’t you call? I think you knew I’d be over at Christopher’s. I would have come home.”
“Because I wanted to know for sure. Now I do.”
She spun on the ball of her foot and marched to her bedroom. When her door slammed, Lee and Christopher stood in the vacuum left by her anger, their emotions in chaos. The faucet was dripping. Lee went over and tried to turn it off, but the steady, monotonous sound continued. Finally Christopher moved up behind her and curved his hands over her shoulders. Wordlessly he turned her around and took her in his arms.
“I’m sorry,” she said, feeling close to tears now that the first rush of rebuttal was over. “That must have been terrible for you.”
“It was about what I expected. How about you?”
“What she said was. How I reacted was a surprise.”
“A surprise?” he said.
“I thought I’d be brimming with guilt. Instead, when she started passing judgment I found myself getting angry. What right has she got to dictate my life? The trouble with my kids is, they’ve never seen me as a sexual person. All I’ve ever been is Mom. Ever since Bill died I’ve always been there for them and I guess they thought I always would be—exclusively. The idea that I could need a man for that stops them cold in their tracks.”
“Still, I’m not sure you should have said that.”
“Said what?” She drew back and cast him a bristly look.
“That our relationship is sexual.”
“Why not? I have a right to that in my life, damn it, with you or any man I choose. I wanted her to know that.”
“It was a jolt for her though, the way you said it.”
“I wanted it out in the open.”
“And now it is, that’s for sure.”
“Christopher, I don’t want to fight with you, too!” She pulled away from him and put away a pot holder that was lying on the countertop, slamming the drawer with her hip. “And anyway, I don’t know why we’re fighting! First you say you want me to tell my kids, and we fight because I won’t. Then I tell them and we fight because I did.”
“Lee . . . Lee . . .” he said, taking her by the shoulders again, forcing her to face him. “Come on. I’m feeling my way here, too. I’m just trying to think of the best way to break this news to the rest of your family, because we’re going to get more of what we just got from Janice, only I have a feeling it’s going to be worse when it gets to your mother and your sister. They’re really going to lay the guilt trip on you.”
She lunged into his arms and held tight. “Oh, Christopher, I hate it when we argue. I love you. I want us to be together, but look what happens when we test the first person, and I haven’t even mentioned marriage yet.”
He drew back and gaped at her in surprise. “You mean you’re thinking about it?”
“Well, of course I’m thinking about it. How could I not be? I love you. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life alone.”
“Oh, Lee . . .” The look in his eyes told her how she’d surprised him. Celebrating, however, took second place to the more serious message he had to impart. He held her by the slope of her neck and spoke earnestly into her eyes. “Then promise me you’ll try to keep from getting angry when they tell you you’re robbing the cradle, and when they accuse you of being a lonely, sad woman who doesn’t know what she’s doing, and when they say that you’re being used and that I’m only after your house and your car and who knows what else, and that I’ll grow tired of you as soon as the first young chick walks by in tight shorts and twitches her butt at me. Because unless I miss my guess, you’re going to have to listen to that and a lot more. But the best way to fight that kind of attitude is by showing them that we’re happy together, not by getting pissed off, okay?”
She rested her forehead against his chin and shut her eyes wearily. “Are they really going to say all that?”
“I think so.”
They stood that way for a spell, taking strength from one another.
Finally Lee asked, “Will you?”
“Will I what?”
“Grow tired of me as soon as the first young chick twitches her butt at you?”
He put a finger beneath her chin and lifted it. “What do you think?”
“I’ve thought about it some—I won’t lie to you and say I haven’t.”
“You wouldn’t be normal if you hadn’t, but that’s one I can’t combat with words. That’s where trust comes in. If I say I love you and I want to commit myself to you for life, you just have to believe that I mean it, and we take it from there. Okay?”
Within a corner of her heart, peace settled. How convincing he was. How wise. Had he vowed never to look at another woman she would have been much less assured. His simple statement of ineluctable fact gave her pause to realize he had just put his finger on th
e basic element upon which all lasting marriages are built. Theirs—should it happen—would be strengthened by this belief, which she shared.
She reached up and kissed him in reply—not heavily, as if stamping her initial in sealing wax, but with a glancing touch of reassurance.
“I’d better go in and check on Janice’s tooth. She’ll be too stubborn to come back out here, and I think her jaw was swollen.”
“Should I stay or go?”
“Stay. You came for breakfast and I’m going to fix it for you. I’ll see to her first though.”
* * *
JANICEwas lying on her side facing the wall when Lee sat down behind her. “Is he gone?”
“No, he’s still here. I’m going to make breakfast for him. What’s happening with your wisdom tooth? Did it flare up suddenly?”
“It’s all infected. I need to have it pulled.”
“Which one? Upper or lower?”
“Lower.”
“Turn over here.”
“You don’t have to worry about me. I can take care of myself,” the girl declared.
“Janice, don’t be so stubborn. I’m not going to stop worrying about you just because I’m dating him.”
Janice flung herself onto her back and fixed her eyes on a piece of furniture behind Lee, who felt her brow.
“My heavens, girl, you have a fever. Have you taken any aspirin?”
“Yes.”
“How long ago?”
“About three in the morning.” The implication was clear: she’d been up waiting for her mother to return.
“I’ll get you some more. Are you in bad pain?”
“It doesn’t feel too pleasant but what can I do on a weekend? I’ll just have to wait till morning to call Dr. Wing.”
“Open your mouth. Let me see.”
“Mother, it’s infected and probably impacted, too. What’s there to see?”
“Is there a bulge by the tooth?”
Family Blessings Page 37
