Separate Beds (23 page)

The scent he wore lingered in the enclosure, much as it did in his car. She snapped out the light again and turned with her handful of hangers.

“I guess I'll take the closet in the other bedroom if it's okay with you.”

“I can push my stuff closer together.”

“No, no, it's okay. The other closet's empty anyway.”

When she disappeared into the room across the hall, he stared into the drawer he'd been filling in the bureau—contemplating.

A short time later their paths crossed in the living room. Clay was occupied putting away his tapes.

“Listen, are you hungry?” Catherine asked. “We didn't have supper or anything.” It was nearly ten P.M.

“Yeah, a little.” He continued his sorting, never glancing up.

“Oh, well . . . gee,” she stammered, “there's nothing here. We could—”

“Just forget it then. I'm really not very hungry.”

“No, we could go out and get a hamburger or something.”

He looked up at her stomach. “Oh, you're probably hungry.”

“I'm okay.”

He sighed, dropped a tape back into the cardboard box where it clacked before the room fell silent. He stared at it, kneeling there with the heels of his hands on his thighs, then shook his head in slow motion. “Aren't we even going to eat together?”

“You're the one who said first you were hungry, then you weren't.”

He looked up at her squarely. “Do you want a hamburger?”

She rubbed her stomach with a timorous smile. “Yes, I'm starved.”

“Then what do you say we stop playing cat and mouse and go out and get one.”

“Okay.”

“Let's leave the rest of this stuff for tomorrow night.”

“Gladly, and tomorrow I'll get some groceries in the house.”

And with that everything seemed better.

The illusion lasted till bedtime. Then, again, they walked on eggshells.

Coming in after their late supper she hurried to remove her coat before he could help her, afraid lest he should inadvertently touch her. He followed her to the living room.

“Feel better?” he asked.

“Yes, I didn't know how hungry I was. We did a lot of work today.”

Then they couldn't think of anything else to say. Clay began an exaggerated stretch, twisting at the waist with his elbows in the air.

Panic hit her and made her stomach twitch. Should she simply exit or offer to make up his bed or what?

They both spoke at once.

“Well, we have to get up—”

“Should I get your—”

She flapped her hands nervously, gestured for him to speak, but he gestured for her to speak at the same time.

“I'll get your bedding,” she got out.

“Just show me where it is and I'll do it myself.”

She avoided his eyes, led the way up the steps to the linen closet. When she started to reach up high he hurriedly offered, “Here, I'll get them down.”

He moved too quickly and bumped into her back before she could move aside. He nearly pulled the comforter down on her head. She plucked a package of sheets and another of pillowcases from the shelves and put them on top of the comforter in his arms.

“I saved the brown and beige ones for you.”

Their eyes met briefly above the bedding.

“Thanks.”

“I'll get your pillow.” She fled to do so.

But they had only two pillows, which were both on the kingsize bed, already encased in pink-flowered pillow slips. There was some sticky hesitancy as she returned with one, saying she guessed he wouldn't need that other pillowcase she'd given him. And then everything went wrong at once because he reached to take her pillow and the comforter tipped sideways and the plastic-wrapped packages slipped off the top and she lunged to try to catch them and somehow their fingers touched and the whole pile of bedding ended up on the floor at their feet.

He knelt down quickly and began gathering it up while she scuttled back to the security of the bedroom, shut the door and was about to begin changing into her nightgown when he came back for his pajamas. He knocked politely, and she let him pass before her to go in and get them, then shut the door again as he left.

By the time she donned her nightgown her stomach was in knots.

She sat down on the end of the bed, waiting for him to go in and use the bathroom first. But apparently he was sitting downstairs waiting for her to do the same thing. Naturally, they both decided to make the move at once. She was halfway down the hall and he was halfway up the steps when they spied each other headed in the same direction. Catherine's feet turned to stone, but Clay had the presence of mind to simply turn around and retreat. Afterward she closed herself into the bedroom again, climbed into the vast bed and lay there listening to the sounds that the walls couldn't quite hide, picturing Clay in those pajama bottoms as he'd been that morning. The toilet flushed, the water ran, she heard him spit after brushing his teeth.

In the bathroom, Clay studied her wet washcloth hanging on the towel rack, then opened the medicine chest to find her wet toothbrush inside. He laid his next to it, then picked up a bottle of prenatal vitamins, studied its label thoughtfully and returned it to the shelf.

She heard the bathroom light snap off, then he knocked gently on her door.

“Catherine?”

Heart clamoring, she answered, “What?”

“What time do you usually get up?”

“Six thirty.”

“Did you set an alarm?”

“No, I haven't got one.”

“I'll wake you at six thirty then.”

“Thank you.”

She stared at the hole in the dark where the door would be if she could see it.

“Good night then,” he said at last.

“Good night.”

He put on a tape and the sound of the music filtered through the dark, through her closed door while she tried to erase all thought from her mind and find sleep.

She was still wide awake when the tape finally stopped.

And a long time later when she heard Clay get up in the dark and get a drink of water in the kitchen.

The way they did things the first time usually set the precedent for their routine. Clay used the bathroom first in the mornings; she used it first in the evenings. He got dressed in their bedroom while she was showering, then she got dressed while he put his bedding away. He left the house first, so he opened the garage door; she left second and closed it.

Before leaving that Monday morning he asked, “What time will you get home?”

“Around two thirty.”

“I'll be later by an hour or so, but if you wait I'll go grocery shopping with you.”

She couldn't conceal her surprise—it was the last thing she'd expect him to want them to do together. Crisp and combed, he stood in the foyer looking up the steps at her. He put a hand on the doorknob, smiled briefly, raised his free hand and said, “Well, have a good day.”

“You too.”

When he was gone, she studied the door, remembering his smile, the little wave of good-bye. Juxtaposed against it came the memory of her father, scratching his belly, roaring, “Where the goddam hell is Ada? Does a man hafta make his own coffee around this dump?”

Catherine couldn't forget it all the way to school in her own car, which she kept expecting to turn back into a pumpkin.

It was an odd place to begin falling in love—in the middle of the supermarket—but that's precisely where it began for Catherine. She was still boggled by the fact that he'd come along. Again she tried to picture her father doing the same, but it was too ludicrous to ponder. She was even further dumbfounded by the silliness that sprang up between her and Clay. It had started out with the two of them learning each other's tastes, but had ended on a note of hilarity which would undoubtedly have seemed humorless to anybody else.

“Do you like fruit?” Clay asked.

“Oranges, I crave oranges lately.”

“Then we shall have oranges!” he proclaimed dramatically, holding a bag aloft.

“Hey, check how much they cost first.”

“It doesn't matter. These look good.”

“Of course they look good,” she scolded, looking at the price, “you've chosen the most expensive ones in the place.”

But when she would have replaced them with cheaper ones, he waggled a finger at her and clucked, “Tut-tut!” Price was no object, he said, when he bought food. And she dropped the oranges back in the cart.

At the dairy case she reached for margarine.

“What are you going to use that for?”

“What do you think, not for a hot oil treatment for my hair.”

“And not to feed to me,” he said, grinning, and took the margarine from her hands. “I like real butter.”

“But it's three times as much!” she exclaimed. Then she reclaimed her margarine and put his butter back in the case.

He immediately switched the two around again.

“Butter is three times as fattening too,” she informed him, “and I
do
have an imminent weight problem to consider.” He made an affected sideward bow, then put her margarine in the cart next to his butter as they moved on.

She spied a two-gallon jar of ketchup up ahead, and when Clay's back was turned she picked up the ungainly thing and came waddling over with it clutched against her outthrust stomach.

“Here,” she puffed, “this should hold you till next week.”

He turned around and burst out laughing, then quickly relieved her of the enormous container.

“Hey, what're you trying to do, squash my kid?”

“I know how you like ketchup on your hamburgers,” she said innocently. By now they were both laughing.

They wandered along behind their mountain of food, and at the frozen foods she chose orange juice and he, pineapple juice. They took turns laying them in the cart like poker players revealing their next cards.

She played a frozen pumpkin pie.

He played apple.

She drew corn.

He drew spinach.

“What's that?” she asked disgustedly.

“Spinach.”

“Spinach! Yuck!”

“What's the matter with spinach? I love it!”

“I hate it. I'd as soon eat scabs!”

He perused the bags and boxes in the display case with a searching attitude. “Mmm, sorry, no scabs for sale here.”

By the time they reached the meat counter they were no longer laughing, they were giggling, and people were beginning to stare.

“Do you like Swiss steak?” she asked.

“I love it. Do you like meat loaf?”

“I love it!”

“Well, I hate it. Don't you dare subject me to meat loaf!”

Warming to the game, she just had to trail her fingers threateningly over the packages of hamburger. He eyed her warningly out of the corner of his eye—a buccaneer daring her to challenge his orders.

She picked up the hamburger, weighing it on her palm a time or two, plotting the insidious deed.

“Oh, yeah, lady?” He made his voice silky. “Just try it.” He grinned evilly, raking her with his pirate's eyes until she stealthily slipped it back where it had come from.

Next he turned on her, ordering autocratically, “You'd better like pork chops!” He took up a challenging stance, at a right angle to the meat counter, feet apart, one hand on a package of chops, the other on the nonexistent scabbard at his belt. The tile of the floor might very well have been the deck of his windjammer.

“Or else what?” she fairly growled, trying to keep a straight face.

He grew cocky, raised one eyebrow. “Or else”—a quick glance to the side, a hint of a smile before he snatched up a different package and brandished it at her—”we eat liver.”

She hooked both thumbs up in her waist, ambled nearer, looked directly into his swashbuckler's handsome, brown face and rasped, “Suits me fine, bucko, I eats my liver rawww!”

He tilted a sardonic brow at the liver.

“More'n likely doesn't know how to cook it.”

“The plague take you, I do!”

A twitch pulled at the corners of his lips. He tried to get the words out without snickering, but couldn't quite make it.

“Lucky for you, woman, be . . . cause . . . I . . . don't.”

And then the two of them were dissolved in giggles again.

Where Catherine's comic instinct had come from she couldn't guess. She'd never suspected she harbored it. But she warmed to it, found herself lifted in a new, spontaneous way by their levity. Somehow Clay—who she had to admit was charming as a swashbuckler—had given her a glimpse of him that she liked. And a glimpse of herself which she liked, as well. Such bouts of good humor sprang up between them more often after that. She was surprised to find Clay not only humorous, but complaisant and even-tempered. It was the first time in her life that she lived free of the threat of erupting tempers. It was an eye-opener to Catherine to learn it was possible to live in such harmony with a male of the species.

The town house, too, wove its charm about Catherine. At times she would come up short in the middle of some mundane chore and would mentally pinch herself as a reminder not to get too used to it. She would load the dishwasher—or worse yet, watch Clay load it—and remember that in a few short months this would all be snatched away from her. He shared the housework with a singular lack of compunction which surprised Catherine. Maybe it started the night he hooked up the washer and dryer. Together they read the new manuals and figured out the machine settings and loaded the washer with their first bundle of dirty clothes and from then on a load was thrown in by whoever happened to have the time.

She returned home one time to find him vacuuming the living room—the new blankets were linty. She stopped in amazement, a smile on her face. He caught sight of her and turned off the machine.

“Hi, what's the smile for?”

“I was just trying to feature my old man doing that like you do.”

“Is this supposed to threaten my masculinity or something?”

Her smile was very genuine now.

“Quite the opposite.”

Then she turned and left him and the vacuum wheezed on again while he wondered what she meant.

It was inevitable that they be bound closer by inconsequential things. A telephone was installed and their number was listed under the name, Forrester, Clay. A grocery list was established on a corner of the cabinet, and on it mingled their needs and their likes. She bought herself a tape by The Lettermen and played it on his stereo, knowing full well it would not always be available for her to use. Mail began arriving, addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Clay Forrester. He ran out of shampoo and borrowed hers, and from then on they ended up buying her brand because he liked it better. Sometimes they even used the same washcloth.

But every night, out came the spare blankets, and he made up his bed on the davenport, put on a tape, and they lay in their separate darks listening to his favorite one night, hers the next.

But by now she had grown to expect that last tape of the day, and left her bedroom door open, the better to hear it.

Thanksgiving came and it was disturbingly wonderful for Catherine. Angela had included both Steve and Ada in her invitation, plus all of Clay's grandparents and a few assorted aunts, uncles and cousins. It was the first time in six years that Catherine, Ada and Steve had celebrated a holiday together, and Catherine found herself awash in gratitude to the Forresters for this opportunity. It was a day steeped in tradition. There were warm cheeks meeting cold, cozy fires, laughter drifting up through the house from the game room below, a table veritably sagging beneath its burden of holiday foods, and of course Angela's magical touch was everywhere. There were bronze football mums laced with bittersweet in the center of the table, flanked by crystal candelabra upon imported Belgian linen. Seated at dinner, Catherine swallowed back the sickening sense of future loss and strove to enjoy the day. Her mother was truly coming out of her shell, smiling and visiting. And it was crazy the way Steve and Clay took to each other. They spent much of the meal badgering each other about a rematch at pool as soon as the meal was over, but with the best of spirits.

How the Forresters take this for granted, thought Catherine, gazing around the circle of faces, listening to the happy chatter, soothed and sated as much by their goodwill as by their food. What happened to my notions about the wicked rich? she wondered. But just then her eyes met Claiborne's. She found a disturbing gentleness there, as if he read her thoughts, and she quickly looked away lest she be drawn to him further.

In the afternoon Catherine received her first lesson in how to shoot pool. Was it accidental or intentional, the way Clay crowded his body close behind her as he leaned to show her how to extend her left hand onto the green velvet, crossing her hip with his right arm, his hard brown hand gripping hers on the cue?

“Let it slide through your hand,” he instructed into her ear, sawing back and forth while his sleeve brushed across her hip. He smelled good and he was warm. There was something decidedly provocative about it all. But then he backed away and it was men against women in a round robin that pitted Clay and Steve against Catherine and a teenage cousin named Marcy. But in no time it was obvious the sides were uneven, so Catherine played with Steve as her partner, and they whipped the other two in short order. Steve, it seemed, had been dubbed “Minnesota Skinny” during the hundreds of hours spent at pool tables during basic training and the years since. Eventually pool was preempted by football, and Catherine found herself snuggled into a comfortable cushion between Clay and Steve. During replays Catherine received her second lesson on the sport, explained succinctly by Clay, who slouched comfortably and rolled his head toward her during his comments.

At the door Claiborne and Angela bade them good-bye, and while Claiborne held her coat, Angela asked, “How are you feeling?”

She raised her eyes to twin expressions of concern, surprised to be asked in so point-blank a way about her pregnancy. This was the first time since before the wedding that anybody had brought it up.

“Pudgy,” she answered with a half smile.

“Well, you're looking wonderful,” Claiborne assured her.

“Yes, and don't let female vanity get you down,” added Angela. “It's only temporary, you know.”

On the drive home Catherine recalled their solicitous attitudes, the concern behind their simple comments, threatened by that concern more than she cared to admit.

“You're quiet tonight,” Clay noted.

“I was thinking.”

“About what?”

She was silent a moment, then sighed. “The whole day—what it was like. How all of your family seems to take it for granted . . . I mean, I've never had a Thanksgiving like this before.”

“Like what? It was just an ordinary Thanksgiving.”

“Oh, Clay, you really don't see, do you?”

“See what?”

No, he didn't see, and she doubted that he ever would, but she made a stab at comparison. “Where I came from, holidays were only excuses for the old man to get a little drunker than usual. By mealtime he'd be crocked, whether we were at home or going to Uncle Frank's. I don't ever remember a holiday that wasn't spoiled by his drinking. There was always so much tension, everybody trying to make things merry in spite of him. I used to wish . . .” But her voice trailed away. She found she could not say what it was she'd wished for, because it would seem guileful to say that she wished for a day like she'd had today.

“I'm sorry,” he said softly. Then he reached over and squeezed her neck gently. “Don't let bad memories ruin your day, okay?”

“Your father was very nice to me today.”

“Your mother was very nice to me.”

“Clay, I . . .” But once again she stopped, uncertain of how to voice her growing trepidation. Catherine didn't think he'd understand that Thanksgiving had been just too, too nice.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

But that
nothing
was a great big lump of something, something good and alive and growing which would—she was sure—be bittersweet in the end.

It was shortly after that when Clay came home one evening with a four-pound bag of popcorn.

“Four pounds!” she exclaimed.

“Well, I'm awfully fond of the stuff.”