Seventh Wonder (21 page)

“I will,” she promised. “Be careful.”

A brief silence hung in the airwaves between them when she wondered if he would say something else. Instead, after a moment he said simply, “Goodnight, Meg.”

“Goodnight.”

Chapter 11

On October the twentieth, John flew from LA to St. Louis, from St. Louis to New York, and finally from New York to Bradley International north of Hartford. Unsurprisingly, the air temperature was noticeably cooler when he stepped off the plane than it had been in California. Immediately he felt a dimorphous mixture of nostalgia and desolation: he was a lonely apparition haunting his own memories.

He almost didn’t recognize his sister, who was waiting for him just inside the gate. Barbara’s hair was shorter, and she had put on some weight - weight that suited her, because it softened her many angles and made her appear more jocund. He was still easily a foot taller than she was, meaning the top of her head fit snugly beneath his chin when he hugged her. “Welcome home, Jack,” she said, employing the old pet name that no one outside his family ever called him.

“Mother’s been beside herself since you called,” said Barbara as they walked to the old Chrysler she’d been driving for years. “I think she’s cleaned the entire house at least three times in the past two days alone. Just be prepared for her to do a lot of fussing - you know how she likes to worry.”

“Yes, that I remember,” said John. “What do you hear from Charlie?”

“He and Linda and the girls are coming down Friday to spend the weekend.”

“I’m glad. It’ll be good to see them.”

“How old were the girls the last time you saw them?” asked Barbara.

John scratched his stubbled cheek as he thought back to the last time he’d been home. “I guess it was for Teresa’s second birthday. So Bonnie would’ve been...four?”

“You’ll be shocked when you see them,” said Barbara. “You won’t believe they’re the same children, I’ll bet. Bonnie turned eight last month, and that girl has shot up like a weed. She’s got Linda’s blond hair and Charlie’s big brown eyes, absolutely gorgeous. And Teresa is in the first grade and smart as a whip.”

John smiled his first genuine smile since he’d talked with Meg on the phone three days ago. (It was sad, really. He used to smile all the time.) “I’m sure they’re great kids.”

They took the Farmington exit off the freeway and headed west on state road 4, deeper into familiar territory. The dairy next to the high school was closed down, and the Penn Fruit store on Farmington Avenue had been replaced with a shiny new Food Fair. Some of the houses looked a bit shabbier, but other than that, everything was much the same as it had been when he left home many years ago.

“How is Roger?” asked John.

“He’s doing well. Just got a promotion at work, so he’s been pretty busy. He’s trying to finish a couple of projects so he can take some time off next spring.”

“Good for him. Have you got a vacation planned? I’d suggest that you come out for a visit, but I won’t be home.”

Barbara grimaced as if in pain, and John immediately felt like an ass. He hadn’t meant anything by it, but he should’ve known better. His sister had inherited their mother’s penchant for worrying. He made a mental note to be more careful, so as not to upset either of them at a time when their concern would be of no use. Fixating on his deployment would accomplish nothing, even though truthfully he’d thought of little else since picking up his freshly inked orders the afternoon before.

“Not a vacation, actually,” Barbara said carefully. She surprised him by turning to peer at him with her trademark crooked grin. “We’re having a baby, Jack,” she whispered. “I’m going to be a mother.”

Cue smile number three for this week. It felt damn good, having something to be happy about. “Barb, that’s terrific! I’m so happy for you.”

The way her face was lit up reminded him of how she used to look when she was a young girl, excited over a new dress or an extra scoop of ice cream. “I’m twenty weeks,” she said. “It’s a little boy.”

“You’ll be an amazing mother, sis. There isn’t a doubt in my mind.”

* * *

John had forgotten how much he enjoyed the company of his mother, most of all when it was just the two of them. She was clever and droll and doting and everything a mother should be. They spent their days pulling weeds and raking leaves and their evenings leafing through old photo albums, playing Hearts and watching
Gunsmoke
and
The Carol Burnett Show
.

The only thing that could have made his time at home any more enjoyable was quite literally thousands of miles away. He’d talked himself out of inviting Meg to join him, not once but at least half a dozen times. He couldn’t afford to have his family fall in love with her, too. It was hard enough already, holding her at arm’s length so as to protect them both. Pressure from his mother and siblings would only serve to make this trying time even more so.

Yet still, he missed her. On Thursday of his first week at home, his mother retired early after a day of cooking and baking, all in preparation for the arrival of Charlie and his family on the following day. John sat at the kitchen table for some time, sketching off a faded photo of Buttons, the dachshund his father had brought home as a gift for Charlie’s ninth birthday. (His brother had tired of caring for the animal within the month, and primary responsibility for her upkeep had consequently fallen to John.) When his eyes began to burn, he moved to the study and browsed the books lined up there in neat, dusty rows.

Hours later, he laid in the same double bed he’d slept on as a child, surrounded by books that had failed to capture his attention. A glance at the clock revealed the extent of his insomnia: 2:12 AM. Gazing up at the ceiling, he did the math: it would only be twelve past eleven in California.

He rolled up out of bed and crept past his mother’s bedroom and back down the staircase. The phone in the hallway had a lengthy cord that allowed him to step around the corner and into the study with it; he shut the French doors carefully behind him and leaned with his back against the wall.

As the phone rang, he prayed he wouldn’t wake Meg’s parents. The last thing he wanted was for either of them to think poorly of him before he’d even had a chance to make a good first impression.

Thankfully, it was Meg who answered with a hushed hello.

“I didn’t wake you, did I?” he asked, unable to keep the smile from his face. Hearing her voice lifted an incredible weight from his shoulders, one he hadn’t even realized existed until it very quickly evaporated.

“I hoped it was you,” she replied. “And no, you didn’t wake me. I just got into bed.”

“You’re lying in bed right now?”

“I am, yes.”

Had her voice grown huskier, or was it just his imagination?

“What are you wearing?” he asked. He fought to keep his tone light, even though he felt strangled by the mere thought of her tangled in sheets that undoubtedly smelled as sweet as she did. He couldn’t be certain she still thought of him the way he thought of her.

“My nightgown,” she said.

John swallowed before dropping his voice an octave. “What about underneath your nightgown?” he countered.

“Nothing at all.” This time there was no mistaking the sultriness of her voice.

He shifted uncomfortably, crossing one ankle over the other. Clearing his throat he said, “There are plenty of directions I’d like to take this conversation, but I’d better not.”

“Why not?”

He chuckled as he slid a hand across the top of his head, shaking it in disbelief. “Because I’m not there, and you’re not here. I want to touch you, but I can’t.”

“I can touch myself though.” Her voice was so quiet as to be almost inaudible.

John felt the beginnings of an especially painful ache spreading from the base of his skull and wondered if it was possible for someone to have an aneurysm on the basis of unspent sexual frustration alone. “Yes,” he breathed. “You can.”

“I do sometimes, you know.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and pinched the bridge of his nose. Envisioning her with her nightgown hiked up around her naked hips and her hand between her legs was nearly insufferable. “What do you think about when you touch yourself?” He sounded as if a noose had been tightened around his neck, compressing his windpipe.

“You,” she said without missing a beat. “In my mind, I replay all of the things we’ve done. Sometimes I add more to it.”

Dear God. “Like what?”

He heard her breath catch, and it brought a smile to his lips. “Come on, sweet Meg. You can’t get shy on me now.”

“Well. Instead of telling you, why don’t I just...show you? Next week, I mean.”

A quiet groan escaped him. “You’re killing me, sweetheart. Next week is an entire eternity away.”

She giggled. “It isn’t that long.”

“You have more faith than I do in my ability to last that long.” He took a deep, calming breath. “Fine,” he said. “Let’s talk about something else, then. What did you do today?”

She laughed lightly, whether at the desperation in his voice or the sudden turn in conversation he couldn’t be sure. “Tuesdays and Thursdays are my days to volunteer at the library. I spent the morning in Reference and then helped out with story hour in the afternoon.”

“Story hour?” he asked.

“For the grade school kids,” she explained. “Today we read
Bread and Jam for Frances
and
Lonely Veronica
.”

“Why is Veronica lonely?” he asked.

“She’s a hippopotamus, and she’s stuck at the top of a skyscraper.”

“Jesus, that’s tragic. I hope it has a happy ending.”

“It does,” Meg replied. He could hear the smile in her voice.

“Thank God. Don’t tell me how it ends, though, in case I ever get to read it myself.”

Again she softly laughed, and John closed his eyes and let his head rest against the wall behind him, soaking in the divine melody of it.

* * *

“Me next! Me next!” Teresa flapped her small, chubby arms enthusiastically as John returned a giggling Bonnie to the safety of the leaf-strewn ground. Laughing, he scooped her up and settled her on top of his shoulders.

“Ready?” he called.

“Ready!” she called back (although in truth it sounded more like “weady”).

John positioned himself at the foot of the colossal mound of leaves he’d raked just that morning and fell carefully backward, taking his squirming, shrieking niece down with him.

“Again!” she cried as she scrambled on all fours back toward the grass.

“Why don’t we go inside for a bit and give Uncle Jack a break?” called out a voice from behind them. They turned to find Linda shuffling toward them from the grass, clutching her sweater clad arms around her midsection in an effort to ward off the unseasonably frosty evening air.

“You’re not tired, are you?” asked Bonnie, whirling around to pin John with her scrutinizing gaze.

John chuckled. “You’d better do as your mom says. We can jump in the leaves more later.”

“That’s right,” Linda agreed. “And besides, Grandma made muffins - she just pulled them out of the oven.”

“Are they the chocolate chip kind?” Teresa wailed.

“Yes, baby, they’re chocolate chip.”

Both girls whooped with glee before sprinting off toward the house, John and the leaves all but forgotten. He laughed as he watched them go; a moment passed before he realized Linda’s gaze was trained on him. She was smiling with her eyes, but the expression didn’t quite reach her lips.

“You look cold,” he said.

Her breath fogged the air as it escaped her in a rushing huff of a laugh. “I’m always getting on my girls for not putting on their jackets before they go outside, and yet here I am misbehaving.”

He offered her his arm, and she huddled close, tucking her small, feminine forearm behind his elbow. “I always did think you’d make a wonderful father, you know,” Linda said.

John glanced down to find her gaze fixed straight ahead. She contritely dipped her head, evidently fearful that she’d overstepped her bounds. Years had passed since he first broke the news to his family that he and Catherine were unable to conceive a baby, and yet still they tiptoed around the subject, handling him like some fragile object. For many, many months he’d more or less scoffed at their too-cautious treatment of the situation. Recently, though, he’d come to mourn this loss in ways that were new and largely unexpected.

“Thank you,” he replied, his voice thickened with unforeseen emotion.

“My daughters are crazy about you,” said Linda. Laughing, she added, “I’m sure after we leave here, you’re all they’ll talk about for at least a couple of days.”

“I’m crazy about them, too. You and Charlie have done a great job with them.”

“A great job with who?”

They glanced up at John’s brother, who had appeared on the side porch, wielding a pair of tongs and a platter of chicken cutlets.

“None of your business, nosy,” joked Linda. She let go of John’s arm to slip past her husband, raising onto her tiptoes to kiss his cheek before disappearing into the house.

“I’ve been tasked with throwing this chicken on the grill,” said Charlie. “Why don’t you grab yourself a cold one and come help?”

“I’ll be right there,” John agreed.

Inside, he squeezed Teresa’s shoulder and ruffled Bonnie’s hair as he passed them to pluck a beer from the refrigerator. Teresa’s face was already smeared with chocolate from the muffin she held in her pudgy hands.

“Take this out to your brother, will you, Jack?” asked his mother. She proffered a bowl of marinade with a brush, and John nodded his agreement.

Charlie was lifting the last of the chicken onto the metal grate when John walked back outside; he accepted the marinade with a passing nod. “So Mom tells me you’ve got a month of leave,” he said.

“Just about,” John replied before taking a pull of his beer. “Twenty-two days, to be exact.”

“And you’re flying back to California next week?”

“That’s right.”

“Why?” his brother asked as he replaced the domed lid on the grill. “What’s in California? Besides sunshine and beaches, I mean.”