Her Lifelong Dream (18 page)

"What happened last week?" Leedy asked. Her breathing
had become irregular and her heart was pounding. Every
fiber of her existence suddenly depended on the next words
that would come out of Jo Anne's mouth.

"Krissy called him. She asked if he wouldn't mind giving
her a lift to pick up her car at the garage after class. She
said it would only take ten minutes ... she said it was at
that place on Fitzpatrick?" Leedy nodded in understanding.
"Krissy said she had her brakes replaced and she had no
way to pick up her car."

"Okay," Leedy shrugged. "So her car was in the shop."
"And maybe pigs can fly!" Jo Anne exclaimed, putting
her hands on her hips. A few people in front of the room
turned and glanced at them. "Anyway," Jo Anne continued,
her voice dropping to a whisper. "Terry saw no harm in
doing Krissy this one favor. But once he had her in his car,
she was all over him! She told him she had fallen madly
in love with him and wanted to spend the rest of her life proving it. She all but tore his clothes off-right there in
the parking lot!"

Leedy flinched, remembering seeing Terry and Krissy
sitting in his car. She remembered how he seemed to want
to say more. "How do you know all this?" Leedy blurted,
her eyes darting to the front of the room. Terry was standing, with his back toward them, firmly reclaiming his elbow
from Krissy's determined grip.

"My husband told me all about it," Jo Anne whispered.
"Terry and Ted have lunch together a few times a month,
remember? Of course, Ted thought the whole thing was
hysterically funny. He said Terry told him Krissy admitted
her car was safe and sound at home. She said it was the
only way she could think of to finally get him alone!"

Leedy tried to imagine Terry alone in a dark parking lot
with a beautiful, willing woman, but the image was too
painful. "What did he do?" she asked, her voice breaking.

"I would have pushed her out onto the street and driven
away! But you know Terry. He's too much of a gentleman
for his own good. Ted said Terry drove Krissy to her house
but then it took him nearly another hour to finally get her
out of his car! Ted thought it was pretty darn amusing that
Terry would be in such a soup. He said he wished he had
to fight off beautiful women that way. But, as you may
have already guessed, my husband is an idiot."

Leedy was stunned. She looked at the front of the classroom. All the other students had finally filed out of the
room except for Krissy. She was talking to Terry, or, judging by the body language, arguing with him. Her hands
were in tight little fists that were perched on her hips defiantly. She was shaking her head, her face an expression
of tight control, her eyes glaring at him angrily. Terry was speaking to her, his rugged jaw clenched and his face determined. Leedy wished she could hear what he was saying.

"That's not all!" Jo Anne continued, her eyes flashing in
anger. "Ted said he called Terry yesterday just to rib him
about this whole Krissy situation and found out that she
had the nerve to show up at his house! Right there in front
of Deanna and everything!"

"I know," Leedy said. "I was dropping Deanna off from
the mall and saw them together, standing in the doorway."

"What did you do?" Jo Anne gasped. "Boy, I wish your
machine had been working this weekend. We could have
had quite a juicy conversation ..."

"I didn't do anything," Leedy said. "I just dropped
Deanna off and waved goodbye."

"You should have stuck around for the action. Ted said
Terry was livid."

"What did he do?" Leedy asked, holding her breath.

"He threw her out on her perfect little bum," Jo Anne
said, folding her arms across her chest. "I'm sure he said
it as nicely as humanly possible. Although I wish he had
told her to get on her broom and FLY AWAY!"

Leedy's ears were ringing with this new information.
"You mean, Terry does not ... like ... Krissy?" was all she
could think to say.

"Of course not!" Jo Anne said, trying to keep her voice
low. "Terry knows Krissy is only interested in furthering
her career ... even if it means destroying his reputation
along the way! And my husband, God bless him, had the
nerve to ask Terry why he didn't take Krissy up on her
offer!"

Leedy looked toward Terry and saw that Krissy was still
standing in the front of the room, none too happy. Sud denly, she didn't look so pretty. For the first time, Leedy
realized there was a hard, brittle edge to her appearance.

Krissy glared at Terry, her face a mask of indignant anger. She was speaking to him, her hand waving toward Jo
Anne and Leedy in the back of the room. She looked their
way, glaring daggers at Leedy.

"What was Terry's answer to Ted's question?" Leedy
whispered to Jo Anne.

Jo Anne's reply was drowned out by angry voices in the
front of the classroom. Leedy and Jo Anne looked up and
saw that Krissy had abandoned whispering tersely in
Terry's ear in favor of a more direct approach.

"Good luck, Mr. Foster," Krissy snarled. It was the first
time Krissy had said anything loud enough for Leedy to
hear her. "You're going to need it by the time I get done
with you! I'm going to file a complaint with the University
about your sexual harassment!"

She gave Leedy one last angry glare, tossed her hair
behind her and then stomped out of the classroom, not
looking behind her.

Jo Anne watched the scene happily and gave Leedy a
happy wink. "Ted told me that Terry said he tried to explain
to Krissy that he was interested in someone else ..." She
left the sentence hanging in the air because Terry was now
almost right next to them.

"I'd like to see her try," he said, walking right up to
Leedy. He slipped her hand into his and squeezed it. "Now
let's get out of here before someone asks me another question. And don't forget, you and I have to talk."

"Okay," Leedy said, squeezing his hand too. "We'll
talk."

He smiled at her and pushed his hand through his mop of curly hair. He was flustered from his confrontation with
Krissy, but also relieved.

"Can we go now?" Jo Anne chided him. "Before any
more young, pretty girls show up and file complaints
against the faculty."

He glanced at Leedy and shrugged as if to apologize. "Jo
Anne, all those pretty girls have finally gone home. Except
for you two ladies, of course."

"Of course," Jo Anne said and poked him in the arm.
"Now can we go?"

Leedy swallowed the lump in her throat and put the tape
recorder into her bookbag. Her hands were shaking and it
was all she could do to not throw her arms around Terry
and weep. He slipped his hand gently on her back and she
could feel a slight tremble to his touch.

"I'm ready. Are you?" he asked. All she could do was
nod.

I'm glad we are all finally together," Jo Anne said.
"I'm so excited, I feel as if I'm about to explode!"

"Yeah," Terry said, glancing at Leedy. "I'm glad too.
I've been wanting to talk to both you and Leedy." He led
them into the hallway. Leedy walked beside him, still holding his hand. She didn't care what Jo Anne thought. She
was all through playing hard-to-get.

"I've been wanting to talk with you too," she said.

"This is business," Jo Anne interjected. "You two will
have plenty of time to talk about other matters after I say
what I have to say."

"What's this about, Jo Anne?" Leedy asked, suddenly
curious. "Do you need banking advice from Terry?"

"Oh, yes," she said. "I need lots of banking advice."

They took Leedy's Jeep to a nearby coffee shop and
found a booth along the wall. Jo Anne sat down on one
side of the booth and Leedy sat down on the other. Her
heart skipped a beat when Terry slid into the seat next to her. She felt his hand softly take hers underneath the table
and squeeze it. Just the feel of his touch made her heart
melt.

She picked up her menu with her free hand and pretended to study it intently while Jo Anne and Terry did the
same. The waitress came quickly, and they all ordered coffee and cheeseburgers.

"I know you're both wondering why I asked you here
tonight," Jo Anne began. Leedy tried to focus her eyes on
her friend, but the feel of Terry's hand wrapped over hers
was too distracting. Jo Anne has something important to
say, Leedy suddenly realized, taking in the bright pink flush
on her cheeks and the way her voice sounded breathless
and quick. She had thought Jo Anne might have been still
worked up over the Krissy Montgomery scandal, but obviously it was something more. But his hand was holding
tightly onto hers and he was sitting so close it was driving
her crazy. She was finding it hard to concentrate on the
business at hand.

"I wanted to talk to Leedy about an idea I have," Jo Anne
finally began. "But first, I want to tell you both that I've
been rehearsing this speech all weekend, so, please don't
interrupt me until I'm finished. After that I'll entertain discussion of all of your questions and concerns."

"Okay," Leedy said. "We won't interrupt."

"That would be an interruption," Jo Anne said with a
sigh. Scolded, Leedy gestured that her lips were zipped shut
and the invisible key had been duly discarded. Jo Anne
took a deep breath and began again. "Okay, then, here goes
nothing ... As you already are aware, Leedy, you and I
have a great deal in common. To a remarkable degree really
... we've talked about this extensively, right?"

"Yes," Leedy said, forgetting she was not allowed to
speak.

"And even though I'm twenty years older than you, we
have similar backgrounds. In fact, we have so much in
common, we have almost identical likes and dislikes."

"Yes," Leedy said, smiling at her encouragingly.

"No talking! ... We both have a background in restaurant management. We both love to cook except you're a
trained chef and I'm more of a self-taught baker. In fact,
if you think about it, our skills compliment each other."

"True," Terry offered. "And you both want to open a
restaurant."

"Yes," Jo Anne said. "But let me finish ... Where was
I? Oh, yes. The restaurants that Leedy and I both envision
are amazingly similar. As a matter of fact, you could safely
say the restaurants we both have in mind are almost one
and the same." Leedy nodded again and Jo Anne went on.
"We both want an upscale, sophisticated restaurant that
serves gourmet food. We both want a banquet hall and a
wine cellar."

"And we've both failed to get loans," Leedy reminded
her.

"Right," Jo Anne said. "And that's the problem."

"No kidding," Leedy said. "Now tell me something I
don't know."

"You're not understanding me, Leedy," Jo Anne said.
"The problem is as clear as the nose on our faces but we
never stopped to think about it. Even now, you have hit the
nail right on the head and still don't know it."

"I'm sorry," Leedy said, confused. "I'm not following
you."

"Let me explain it again," Jo Anne said. "The problem is that both of us have failed to make our restaurants a
reality."

"Yes," Leedy said. "Don't rub it in. We've both failed
to open our restaurants."

"Don't you see?" Jo Anne yelped, her voice rising in
excitement. "You said it again! We both failed to get our
loans approved. Think about it, Leedy! What if we tried to
open up a restaurant together?"

"Huh?" Leedy asked. She suddenly forgot that Terry was
still holding her hand underneath the table.

"Don't you get it?" Jo Anne continued. "Our problem is
that both of us are trying to do this alone!"

Terry's face split into a huge smile. "I was hoping you
two would come to this conclusion. I love it, Jo Anne! It's
a great idea! And it just might work."

Leedy looked at Terry and then back to Jo Anne. "What
idea?"

"You're not making this easy on me, are you?" Jo Anne
exclaimed. "Earth to Leedy! Let's open a restaurant together! You and me. We can be partners!"

Leedy was not sure if she heard them right. "What?" she
asked.

"We could do it!" Jo Anne exclaimed.

It took a minute for the words to sink in. Leedy had
never considered sharing her dream of opening her own
restaurant with anyone else. "Together?"

"Yes!" Jo Anne said, practically shouting. "We'll make
terrific partners! Why not? We both want the same thing!"

It was an idea that made her head spin. A partnership?
With Jo Anne? Jo Anne who knew enough about the business to manage ten restaurants. Jo Anne who tackled every problem with an energy that Leedy envied. Jo Anne who
had become a dear friend.

"I never thought about a partnership," Leedy stammered.
"It isn't a bad idea."

"I heard that the old bakery on the corner of seventh and
Market Streets is available to buy," Terry said. "That might
be just the place you two have been looking for."

"We could go look at it, Leedy," Jo Anne said. "What
do you say?"