Barefoot Beach (16 page)

Scott Goddard played it cool as we gathered for the Tuesday night ballroom class. He positioned himself at the end of the line next to Lynn Brevard and partnered with her for two of the six practice dances. I'd gotten a wave from across the room when he entered and not much more. I finally landed him for the last foxtrot to what I thought was going to be “Cheek to Cheek,” the Sinatra version. Brave or foolhardy, I'd chosen that as background music for the first step in getting on with my life—my, as Margo had reminded me that morning, “emotionally stunted and stalled-out life.”

“Some tips for the new and improved you,” she'd said. “Be open, warm, toss your damn Giorgio perfume, which is
très
cliché and
très
passé. I recommend Prada's scent called Candy, which makes you, well, edible. Wear those shoes I forced you to buy at the Coach outlet. They make your legs look fabulous. And, for God's sake, show the man a little cleavage. He's a war hero; he's earned it.”

I followed three of her four suggestions, though Candy, the quickly purchased Prada perfume, smelled fattening to me. But no cleavage. Not with Tom Hepburn, his cataracts recently removed, on the prowl.

When I finally landed Scott—outmaneuvering Mrs. Powell, who was also headed his way—he seemed unimpressed with my efforts. His leg had been working fine with Lynn during the tango. She'd only just learned the
basics, but Scott had mastered some pretty fancy steps two years back and led her with confidence. Positioned properly, upper body against upper body, he spiraled her flawlessly on the turn. As I watched both of them laugh at the smooth perfection of the move, I felt a sting of jealousy. An exotic feeling for me, jealousy.

Lynn had gotten the relaxed version of Scott. As he and I began to dance, I got what he'd once called “post posture,” ramrod-straight spine and stiff arms, which I didn't correct because I concluded—pulse picking up—that he knew better and was sending me a message. Maybe that his invitation for an after-class drink had expired due to my silence, my cowardice. In spite of which, and in spite of Bobby's unannounced switching from “Cheek to Cheek” to “Strangers in the Night,” which I should have taken for a stop sign, I plunged ahead, wanting to get it over with, not wanting to answer to Margo.

So I blurted into what was essentially empty space, “That glass of wine after class? I'd like to take you up on it. How about tonight?” There. Done. Margo would be proud.

Or not. Because as I finished my blurt with a hard swallow, Scott missed a step, and although I gripped his hand and shifted my weight to help him balance, he floundered before he was able to right himself. He muttered, “Sorry, Nora. Don't know what happened there. I'm a little unsteady.”

Me too,
I thought.

“I swear I haven't been drinking.” Then he smiled. The smile expanded to a grin. “Absolutely yes to the wine. I missed dinner too. But let's see if we can remedy that on both counts. Have you been to the Flying Jib yet? It's only been open a month.”

Okay, here we go.
It should have been an easy response. A sprightly, “No, but friends of mine have”—Margo and Pete, who never missed the newest, trendiest restaurants—“and they liked it a lot.” Simple. Instead,
his question translated for me as “On your mark, get set . . . !” and I choked at the starting line.
Come on, Nora!
I coached myself into a negative shake of the head.

“No? Me either. But it's got a great view of Teal Duck Creek, I hear the calamari is fantastic, and one of my VFW buddies is the manager. Sound good to you?”

My head bob elicited a hand squeeze from Scott.

Margo might have been right. Saying yes to him was like hitting the ocean in June when the water was still cold. The icy first wave paralyzed you. But if you dipped deeper and stayed in longer, you got used to the temperature and soon you were bathed in something warm and wonderful. I'd already lost my shivers. The apprehensive ones, anyway.

“Did you drive into town?' he asked.

I'd walked, to discharge some nervous energy, to see how the hibiscus and the magnolia trees were blooming in the yards along the residential stretch and the geraniums were flourishing in the window boxes of the shops on Clement Street, but mostly wanting to have the right answer if Scott asked that question.

His eyes brightened at my response and he said, “If you wait at the back door after class, I'll get the car and pick you up.”

As Sinatra sang, “Dooby-dooby-doo,” and Scott swung me into the final turn, I noticed some looks had settled on us. Usually any chatter between my partner and me was focused on brief instructions or corrections: lean into the step; pivot on your heel for that turn. But Scott and I, even with Bobby's musical substitution, were less strangers in the night and more cheek to cheek. Also whispering nonstop. That drew occasional, and I thought approving, glances from Tom Hepburn, and a lingering inquisitive stare from the Felchers. The last thing I needed was teacher's pet gossip circulating in this group.

“How about you leave first,” I said, hitching my neck toward the others, who always exited, not out the main door to the boardwalk, but
through the back door to the street. “I'll follow in a few minutes and, if you don't mind, stop for me in front of Ledo's Pizza.” The opposite direction from the Turquoise Café, where this gang went for coffee after class.

He got it. “Copy that.” Then, after a pause: “I've got to tell you, Nora, I didn't think you remembered our last conversation. The end of it anyway, when I asked you for a . . . well, I guess you could call this a date, right?”

Margo's invisible hand smacked my head into a nod.

“And if you did remember, I bet on no for an answer.”

“Stay away from Atlantic City,” I said. “You'd lose your shirt.”

He reared back, off the beat, and gave out a hearty laugh. My cheekiness had caught him by surprise. Me too. Or maybe it was my dimple that emerged only with my widest smile. This was a Nora he hadn't seen before. I think he liked her.

At the Flying Jib, we were greeted by Scott's buddy with a half bow for me and a cuff on the shoulder for Scott, who'd phoned from the car to reserve a table. I got the once-over, twice. Scott got a discreet bob of the head. Affirmative, I guessed.

“I put you right on the water,” the manager said, as he personally escorted us to the table set next to a panoramic sweep of window.

“May I present Teal Duck Creek, complete with a raft of green-winged teal and mallards, plus a few cranky geese and a couple of imported swans. It's beautiful in this twilight, isn't it?”

A flock of ducks, their tails shimmering iridescent, took off into a cloudless pewter sky. “Very,” I said.

We peeled our gazes from the creek and took in the room, which was spacious and dressed in brass and mahogany with nautical touches. This late, it was only a quarter filled, with subdued chatter from other tables. He handed us the drinks menu. “Happy hour is over, but for you, mate,
and the lady, of course, we'll make an exception. Our fried green tomatoes are the best on the shore.”

After consulting with me, Scott ordered the mini crab cakes, calamari, and the tomatoes to share and a vodka martini with three olives for himself. I ordered something called a Mango-Peach Fizz, which sounded frilly even to me. When I told the server to go easy on the peach schnapps and asked to substitute seltzer water for the champagne, Scott raised an amused eyebrow. And when the server placed the drink in front of me, he commented, “It matches your dress.”

It did. The dress was made of a silky fabric that defined my shape but didn't cling, and its creamy coral color was a flattering choice for a redhead. I'd added a gold chain and gold-and-coral earrings. “I guess I'm coordinated,” I said.

“You won't get an argument from me on that. In my case, even when I had both my own feet, they were two left ones.”

I laughed. “You've come a long way, Scott. I can say from recent personal experience, your lead is strong and confident.”

“Well, that depends on who I'm leading.” He turned away to gaze out the window, where a parade of geese waddled down the lantern-lit pier. I heard him inhale a deep breath before turning back to say, “I'm glad we—well, especially you—decided to do this, Nora. Lesson here. You never know what life has in store.” He lifted his glass. “To . . .” He stalled out for a few seconds. “To surprises.”

I lifted mine to the sentiment, though my record with surprises wasn't particularly reassuring.

We took our first sips.

“Ahhh. Fine martini. Dry as Blackbeard's bones. How's yours?”

“Nice, fruity. Blackbeard would have pitched it overboard. It's what my mother would have called a ladies' cocktail.”

“Your mother.” He leaned toward the just-arrived food, which was a small-plate feast, speared a ring of calamari, and handed me his fork.
The bite of squid was crisp outside, tender within. “You mentioned her in class a few times. She was some kind of professional dancer. Onstage, right? Broadway?”

“
The Fifties Follies
was her only show, and it closed after a week. But for ten years, she danced as a Rockette at Radio City Music Hall. That's where my dad met her. He was what they used to call a stage-door Johnny. Love at first sight.”

“I hear that can happen,” Scott remarked, stabbing a crab cake. “Sometimes it works out. Sometimes not.” Ah, were we in the Bunny hutch here?

“It worked for my folks,” I said. “They had the proverbial marriage made in heaven.”

“Had? They're gone, your parents?”

“Dad passed away a few years ago. My mother died when I was seventeen. Lung cancer.” I slugged my fizzy drink, hoping it would blur unwanted images of Mamma-mia's last days. Especially the one of me feeling so helpless, sitting at the edge of her bed, spoon-feeding her the only thing she wanted and was able to get down. Coffee ice cream. Since then, the thought of it turned my stomach.

“Seventeen is a lousy age to lose a parent,” Scott murmured, and with that—no warning—my eyes filled. Which was ridiculous. My mother had been gone for thirty years. I was on a date with someone I liked. More than liked. Was incredibly attracted to. Had, in fact, made the subject of some very erotic, forbidden fantasies. And now the man of my dreams was a reality, sitting across from me while the table's candle shed pearly light on his strongly angled face, his sympathetic half smile, and I was digging up ancient memories?

We should have been joking, flirting. Or at least trading some edited personal history over the calamari before we moved into personal geography. But no, I'd detoured us to the Garden of Eternal Rest in Flatbush. What had I been thinking? Or had the bartender messed up the order
and flooded my drink with champagne, notorious loosener of tongue and other body parts, the same de-inhibitor that got me in trouble with the not-so-cutest boy at my twenty-fifth high school reunion? Was it the alcohol talking?

If it was, Margo's disembodied voice drowned it out: “Stop with the ‘one foot in the grave' conversation. For heaven's sake, Nora, give the poor grim reaper a break. Don't you read books? Watch TV? Vote? Even politics is better than death for first-date chitchat.”

Yet, that was when—and, I thought, why—Scott reached across the table, lifted my hand, and pressed it to his lips.

Now, that was a surprise. I felt a rush of pleasure so fresh it made me go woozy. God forbid, though, I should relish the moment for more than five seconds. The pure pleasure was almost immediately followed by a rolling fog of confusion.

“I'm sorry,” I began. “I didn't mean to be a downer. It just . . .”

“Don't apologize. Please.” He folded my hand into his. “People should say what they feel as long as it doesn't hurt anyone. I learned that the hard way much too late in life. Listen, if it makes you any more comfortable, I'll match you one for one. My dad took off when I was about the same age you were when your mom died. The family hasn't heard from him since. He was a Vietnam vet who self-medicated with scotch. The thing is—we got through it. You and I got through a bunch of other stuff too.” The handsome, heroic, astonishing man across from me freed my hand so he could hoist his glass. I hoisted mine.