Reflections of Yesterday (8 page)

“No.” She kept her head down. “I don’t think we should see each other again.”

Simon was utterly stunned. “You don’t mean that.”

She shook her head. “We’ll talk about it later.”

“No, we won’t.” He held her at arm’s length. “We’ll talk about it now. I love you, Angie Robinson. Do you understand me?”

“Oh Simon, please don’t say that.”

“I love you,” he repeated.

“Don’t, Simon. This isn’t funny.”

“I tell a girl how I feel and she accuses me of joking? You have a lot to learn about me.”

She sniffled and wiped the tears from her face. “Stop it right now, you hear?”

“I love Angie,” he shouted, tossing back his head. He wanted the world to know. Loving Angie wasn’t an embarrassment; she was the best thing that had ever happened in his life.

“Simon.”

“I love you,” he whispered, drawing her into his arms.

“I won’t go back there,” she whispered defiantly.

“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t put you through that.” With their fingers entwined, they walked to the parking lot. From there they drove to their favorite drive-in and ate thick hamburgers.

That summer Angie had gotten a part-time job working at Garland Pharmacy. Simon picked her up in the morning and dropped her back home when she was finished. He sometimes worked at the bank, but he didn’t recall that he did much of anything worthwhile.

“Are you going to be working there after college?” Angie asked one night. They were parked in their favorite spot at Three Tree Point.

“I’ll probably take over for my dad someday,” Simon answered, more interested in kissing Angie’s earlobe than talking.

“Is that what you want to do?”

Simon grinned and straightened. Angie had a way of doing this whenever their kissing became too hot and heavy. With any other girl he would have pressed her, but not Angie. He didn’t want to do anything she wasn’t ready to try. It wasn’t easy not to touch her. Some nights he was afraid the frustration would kill him.

“I’ve never thought about doing anything else but working in the bank. Why?”

“No reason.”

She was quiet after that and didn’t resist when he turned her lips to his and kissed her long and hard, pulling her lower lip between his teeth and sucking on it. Angie had a beautiful mouth: wide, soft, passionate. Simon loved the feel of it under his own. But then he loved everything about her.

As usual, he dropped her off a block before Oak. She sat for a moment, staring at her hands. “Lloyd Sipe was in Garland’s today.”

“And?”

“He asked me to a movie this weekend.”

Simon felt a lead balloon sink in his stomach. “You’re not going, are you?”

“I told him I wouldn’t.”

Simon relaxed.

“But I think it might be a good idea if we didn’t see so much of each other for a while.”

“Why?” he exploded.

“I’m afraid,” she whispered. “Afraid because I love you so much. I … I want us both to start seeing others. Just until school starts. We can talk about things in September.”

Simon’s immediate reaction had been to argue, but eventually she had worn him down. They stopped dating. The separation nearly drove Simon crazy. He loved her; it was only natural that he wanted to be with Angie. But in the months that they’d been seeing each other, something else, something more far-reaching, had happened. Angie had become his best friend. Nothing seemed right without her. His life had been ripped open, leaving a gaping hole exposed. Even Cal, who had been Simon’s friend since grade school, couldn’t fill the gap. For a long time Simon didn’t date. He couldn’t see that it would do any good. When Angie realized he wasn’t seeing other girls, she started dating Lloyd Sipe. Simon got the message and asked out Kate Holston. He found her even more boring than Shirley. Later that summer his mother arranged a date for him with the visiting niece of one of her Garden Club friends. Jill Something-or-other had hidden a pint of vodka in her purse and proceeded to get smashed. By the end of the evening, Simon couldn’t drive her back to Auntie fast enough. Laughing, her hair in a wild disarray, Jill had placed her hand high on his thigh and claimed she wasn’t in any hurry to get home. If he knew “someplace private,” there were lots of things she could think of to do to kill time.

The first day of their senior year, Simon had stopped Angie in the hall. “You said we’d talk. Are you ready?”

She smiled and nodded.

They met outside the library and drove to Three Tree Point. Simon parked the car, turned off the engine, and reached for Angie. He held her so hard that for a moment he feared he might have hurt her. “It’s not the same,” he whispered into her hair. “It’ll never be right unless it’s you in my arms.”

Her own words were muffled as she buried her face in his shoulder, but the strength of her hold told him everything he needed to know.

With Angie, Simon was on the same intellectual and spiritual plane. By early the next spring they were a hairbreadth from exploring the sexual plane.

“Angie, I love you; I want to marry you.”

“Don’t ask me,” she pleaded, spreading eager kisses across his face. “Please, don’t ask.”

Simon was so inflamed that controlling himself took a superhuman effort. “We’ve got to stop, Angie. Right now. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice soft and willing. “I understand.”

He leaned his head against the back of the car seat and took in deep, agonizing breaths.

“Can … can you hold me, Simon?” she pleaded. “Just for a few minutes.”

“Oh Angie. This does it,” he muttered. “I’m talking to my dad tomorrow.”

Angie turned stricken eyes to him. “About what?”

“Us.”

“Simon, they’re not going to let us get married.”

“They can’t stop us. I love you. After last summer, I know I don’t ever want to be without you again.”

The confrontation with his parents had been the worst thing Simon had ever faced. Angie had wanted to go with him. Later he thanked God that he hadn’t let her. The first thing his mother asked him after he announced that he wanted to marry Angie was if she was pregnant.

Simon couldn’t believe that his mother would even suggest such a thing. It only proved that Georgia Canfield didn’t know Angie.

“Of course she isn’t. We haven’t even made love. Angie doesn’t want to until we’re married.”

“Can’t you see what she’s after?” his father had demanded. “This little girl from Oak Street isn’t stupid. Naturally she doesn’t want to do it until after you’re married. Men don’t like to pay for what they can get free.”

It took all of Simon’s restraint not to shout at his parents that it wasn’t like that with him and Angie. The taste of gall filled his mouth at the thought that the two people who supposedly loved him so much would try to take the beautiful relationship he shared with Angie and make it into a sordid, ugly thing.

“You’re only seventeen,” his mother pleaded.

“And in this state you need our permission to marry,” Simon Senior interjected. “And as
far as I’m concerned, you don’t have it.”

His father had come to Simon’s bedroom later and sat on the mattress beside him. He draped a fatherly arm over Simon’s shoulder and assured him that Angie was the type of girl for Simon to sow his wild oats with. No need to marry her kind. Later, he suggested, another girl would come along from the right kind of people, and Simon would feel just as strongly about her. At seventeen, Simon wasn’t ready for the responsibilities a wife and possible family would entail. He should have fun with Angie, but be careful that she didn’t get pregnant. Simon’s jaw had been clenched so tight that his teeth ached for hours afterward.

“You don’t need to tell me what they said,” Angie murmured, when they met later.

“Listen,” Simon argued, “I’ve got everything worked out. We’ll get married after my birthday.”

“But you’ll have left for college and …”

“I’m not going to the U.”

“Simon, you’ve got to. Your father went there, and his father before him.”

“Marrying you is more important than some stupid tradition.”

Angie’s shoulders had drooped as she slowly, sadly, shook her head. “I won’t let you do that.”

“We don’t have any choice.”

“Your schooling is important.”

“You’re the most important thing in my life, Angie.”

It had seemed crazy that the only serious rift in their relationship had been over getting married. Angie was adamant that Simon continue with his schooling in the fall. She wouldn’t marry him otherwise. What she didn’t know was that his father had already anticipated his son’s defiance and had threatened to cut off Simon’s trust fund money. Simon could never manage school while making a home for himself and Angie at the same time. As for college, he didn’t care. Even being approached about a possible basketball scholarship didn’t faze Simon. All he cared about was Angie.

Not finding a happy solution to their dilemma, Simon had come up with a compromise. It wasn’t the perfect answer. But when he said his vows in the church that night, he had meant every word.

Sweat poured off Simon from his long run just as effortlessly as the memories of Angie had filled his mind. He moved from the long driveway into the house and headed for the bathroom to shower. Stripping, he turned on the pulsating power spray and turned his face into the jet stream, letting water wash down on him. Even the pounding water whispered Angie’s name. He felt like singing. The realization produced a smile. It had been years since he’d sung in the shower.

Stepping onto the bathmat, Simon reached for a thick towel. A frown drove his dark brows together. His wet hair glistened as he eased his long arms into a starched dress shirt and fastened the top button. At seventeen he’d been more in love than he had at any other time in his life, he mused. A love that pure and good wasn’t supposed to happen to a rosy-cheeked kid. Most people search a lifetime and never experience what he had those years with Angie. With a vengeance, he jammed a gold cuff link into place.

Dressed now, and ready for the office, Simon went to the kitchen and poured a cup of hot coffee. He glanced at his gold wristwatch. A thousand times he had questioned what a seventeen-year-old boy could know of love. Little, he admitted freely now, but enough to realize that if it wasn’t Angie in his arms, it wasn’t love. He emptied the coffee cup in the sink and moved to the garage. The red convertible seemed to smile at him. This weekend he’d see about starting her up again. For now he had to hurry or he would be late to the bank.

He parked in his usual spot and jingled the car keys before putting them in his pocket.

Once inside the bank, he began whistling as he walked across the large marble floor, drawing his assistant’s blank stare.

“Good morning, Mr. Canfield.”

“Morning, Mrs. Wilson,” he repeated cheerfully. Five people in the bank gaped in surprise.

His secretary located Angie’s business number in Charleston. Simon had lost her once; he wasn’t going to make that mistake again. He loved Angie as much now as he had twelve years ago.

His heart was pounding as he punched in the telephone number. She answered on the third ring.

The sharp corners of Angie’s mind were crowded with a thousand niggling thoughts. She should be thinking of Glenn, not Simon. She was home now and engaged to a wonderful man who loved her. And she loved Glenn in return, only … only things in Groves Point hadn’t turned out as she’d expected. She had hoped to find Simon married and happy, with a house full of rambunctious children. Instead she’d found a bitter, disillusioned man trapped in the same limbo that had held her prisoner all these years. She had traveled to Groves Point seeking release from the past. The trip had given her that and washed away the guilt that had plagued her from the moment she had accepted the money from Georgia Canfield. But with the release came another set of regrets. Simon.

Determinedly she pushed thoughts of him to the back of her mind and zipped up the soft pink smock that hung from a hook in the back of her shop, Clay Pots. It had been named for her father, and he was proud of her small business venture. She hadn’t told Clay about her weekend trip. It was better that he never know. Her father had yet to learn that she had accepted Glenn’s proposal. The three of them were having dinner together Thursday night. Glenn and Angie planned to tell Clay then. Not that he’d be surprised.

“Morning, Donna.”

“Morning.” Donna was busy placing the cut flowers in the refrigerated compartment in the front of the shop and didn’t glance up.

Angie’s one full-time employee worked the early shift and stopped on her way in to the shop to buy cut flowers direct from the wholesaler.

“Angie.” Donna stuck her blond head around the glass case. “There was a phone call for you earlier. I left the name on your desk.”

“Thanks.” Absently, Angie leafed through the orders for the day, dividing them between Donna and herself. Donna manned the counter in the morning and Angie took over in the afternoon.

Her heartbeat came to an abrupt halt when she glanced at the pink slip on her desk. The note was brief:
Simon Canfield phoned, will try again later
.

Every time the phone rang for the next four hours, Angie stiffened and prayed it wasn’t
Simon. Everything had already been said. All Angie wanted to do was bury the hurts of the past and build a new life from the ashes of Groves Point. She couldn’t think of what to say to Simon or how to explain her feelings to him. It would sound ridiculous to shout at him that it wasn’t supposed to have happened this way. Erroneously, she had assumed him to be married and happy. She wanted to tuck him neatly into a private corner of her life, like a favorite book once treasured but now outgrown.

“You’re as jumpy as a bullfrog today,” Donna complained early in the afternoon. “What’s the matter with you?”

“Nothing,” she lied. As she spoke the phone pealed. Something inside her, an innate alarm system, warned her even before she picked up the receiver that it was Simon.

“Clay Pots.”

Simon chuckled. “Now, where did you ever come up with a name like that?”

“Hello, Simon.” She knew she sounded stiff and unnatural, but she couldn’t help it. She realized that turning her back to Donna would only arouse her employee’s suspicions. Her hand tightened around the receiver until the pressure pinched her ear.