We Interrupt This Date (8 page)

He leaned back in his chair and stretched.
“It’s Marlene. We divorced about five years ago.”

“I’m sorry.” Was I? I hadn’t been around her
much, but his ex hadn’t made any secret of the fact that she didn’t
care for any of Jack’s friends, me especially. I’d thought at the
time she was a world class snob. I’d felt like shaking some sense
into Jack, but then he and Marlene married suddenly, a month before
I met T. Chandler.

He rolled his shoulders in a shrug. “We were
a mismatch from day one and both too green to figure it out. I
learned from the whole experience that opposites might attract, but
it can be hell trying to stay together. At least we didn’t have any
kids to divide up. She’d bought a couple of Persian cats and she
retained custody—no argument from me. What about you?”

“I don’t have any cats,” I said.

He leaned across the table and tweaked my
hair. “How many kids do you have besides your little boy?”

He knew about Christian. I’d sent a birth
announcement and received in return a card with a terse
congratulatory note written in a feminine hand and with a twenty
dollar bill tucked inside. At the time, I was torn between going up
to New Jersey and slapping Marlene silly or calling to give her a
piece of my mind. Of course, I’d done neither.

“Only Christian. My ‘little boy’ started
college a few weeks ago.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I could say something
trite about time flying, but I won’t; that would make me feel old.
Wow. You have a grown kid.”

“Hey.” I playfully smacked the back of his
hand. “I’m not exactly ready for a nursing home.”

“I can see that.” Amusement showing in the
crinkles around his eyes, he let his gaze travel over me with what
I hoped was appreciation for my twenty-fivish figure. Okay, I’ll be
honest—thirty-ninish figure.

“Yeah, it’s been all of a month since
Christian left for Virginia. And I realized only a few days ago I’m
living alone for the first time in my life. No Mama or T. Chandler
to run my life. No loud stereo or TV blasting from Christian’s
room. No teen-aged boys crowding me out of my own kitchen. I’m
almost an empty nester.”

“You like that? Being an empty nester, I
mean.”

I thought about the question before I
answered. “Mostly.” I’d forced myself to spend the first afternoon
post-Christian working in my garden. By the end of the day, part of
the gloom had lifted, but it wasn’t until the past week that I’d
quit listening for Christian’s step in the hallway every afternoon.
I was still lonely at times, nothing I couldn’t handle. Like Mama
always says, life is full of tradeoffs. “It’s not like he won’t be
home for holidays. I’m enjoying the peace and quiet. I like being
able to wander the house in my nightclothes if I want to and watch
ancient movies without Christian pasting on a look of superiority
and telling me I’m an old fogie. He’s sure I could learn so much
about modern culture from an evening of football.”

“Well…” Jack straightened in his chair and
rubbed the small of his back. “Ouch. I hurt myself on a
construction site a few months ago and I sometimes get a reminder
twinge. What were we talking about? You home alone. I’d say you
deserve time for yourself.”

Emmie refilled our coffees, and Jack and I
talked on, first going through a round of “remember the time?”

“All our friends thought we were perfect for
each other,” I said.

“But we found out better.” A twinkle appeared
in his eyes. “Remember when I broke up with my girlfriend and you’d
just dumped your guy and we tried making out on the couch at my
house? Talk about a lack of chemistry--it just was not going to
happen between us.” He smiled, then the smile became a chuckle, and
then I thought he’d fall out of his seat howling like a coyote.

I tried to force a laugh of my own, but the
attempt died somewhere around my lips. My face flamed at the
memory. We’d exchanged a few tentative kisses when his mother
sauntered into the room trailed by the new preacher from the
Baptist Church. I’d jumped half out of my skin and rolled off the
couch onto the floor to land on my butt with a solid thump while
Jack said something about me being there to help him with his math
homework.

I’d made an excuse to Mrs. Maxwell and Pastor
Green and left. But my recollection of the kiss was that it had
every bit as much chemistry as I’d hoped for, enough to put all
thoughts of anyone except Jack out of my mind for weeks to come.
Jack must have thought so, too, because he’d asked me out a couple
of times after that. I’d accepted and then had to cancel at the
last minute to babysit my sister and to handle one crisis or
another for my mother. We’d gone away to different colleges not
long after. And met our spouses. And lost touch until now.

We played catch up for another half hour.
Jack was in an on again off again relationship with a woman named
Kelly who was planning to visit him in Charleston. We gave each
other the condensed versions of our divorces and discussed our
jobs.

Jack was an architect. I, on the other hand,
had never lived up to my potential. Just ask Mama. But I wasn’t
ashamed to tell him about my stint behind a lopsided
desk—especially now that I was leaving.

“You’re not happy with your job,” he said, in
response to my telling him how much I hated dealing with nasty
customers. “That’s not surprising for someone of your intelligence.
Have you found something else?”

“A friend in real estate has come to my
rescue.” Though I’d known both of them for years, somehow Veronica
and Jack had never managed to meet. “She’s offered me something I’m
pretty excited about.” I didn’t tell him I hadn’t actually had the
nerve to take Veronica’s offer until I got fired. The job at
Odell’s was bad enough. Getting rejected from that job was its own
new form of humiliation.

“You’re going into real estate?”

“No, she has a new business starting up and
she’s going to make me her manager.”

“Sounds promising. What’s it involve?”

Emmie brought yet another refill, though
after three coffees my bladder was screaming for relief. I sent it
a silent message to hang in there.

“Ghost tours.” I dumped a packet of sweetener
into my cup and watched it float like dust on top of the dark
liquid.

He raised an eyebrow. Lowered it and raised
the other one. “Ghost tours, as in looking for spirits in
graveyards?”

“Something like that. You know how it is. In
a historic town like Charleston ghost hunting is popular with
tourists. But my friend has a great angle, something that should
get us a lot of business. She bought an old house that started life
as a residence for a man who was rumored to be a pirate. Since its
pirate owner days it’s served as a makeshift jail, church, and
music school before it ended up as a boarding house, fell on hard
times and was finally abandoned. She’s restoring it to its original
state and plans to open for regular tours during the day and ghost
tours at night. It’ll be finished in another few weeks.

“According to local legend, the original
owner was a larger than life type called—behind his back, I
presume--Devilhearted Eli. He still, so people say, clomps the
halls exuding ill-will. And he’s just the main character. There are
supposed to be other ghosts who make their appearances if they’ve
nothing better to do. A former night watchman reported hearing
screams, seeing mysterious lights, and smelling perfume, before he
finally put in notice.”

“Any chains rattling in the attic?”

“Jack Maxwell, are you making fun of me?”

He put his hand over mine and left it there.
“Of course not. And I don’t have to ask if you’re taking the job.
You look happier and more content and confident than I’ve ever seen
you. Not at all an emotional wreck of a divorcee like I might have
expected.”

“Well, I’m all grown up now and
it
has
been a year, and I’m
quite sure I never…” I broke off as I felt a slow blush crawl up my
cheeks. An emotional wreck of a divorcee? He was exactly right now
that I thought about it. “Okay, up until a couple of days ago, I
dragged around feeling angry with myself for marrying the wrong guy
and sticking around for years, when it was long past time to get up
off my butt, stop punishing myself, and start living again. I’ve
even put off finding a new job until I was forced to.”

I brushed my hair back from my face, raised my chin,
and looked directly into his blue, blue eyes. “But I’m not the same
girl you used to know. My son is grown, my sister lives clear
across the country, and I’ve learned to say no to my mother. From
now on it’s my turn to be first in my life without having to
sacrifice myself for others.”

The part about saying no to my mother was an
exaggeration. And maybe I’d been forced by circumstances—Odell
firing me--to put myself first, but that wouldn’t matter if I were
successful at it.

He looked doubtful, but said politely, “I
wish you the best.”

“I’m going to need your good wishes.” I’d
just glanced sideways out the window. A woman who looked an awful
lot like my mother was walking by on the opposite side of the
street. I squinted, trying to make out more detail, but the shadows
on that side were too dark. It couldn’t be Mama—the woman was
walking with a man. But seeing the Mama-look-alike was enough to
remind me that I had a fight ahead of me. “I haven’t told Mama yet.
She has very definite ideas on what are and are not acceptable
careers for her daughters. Trust me, ghost tours are not on the
list.”

“I remember your mother. She’s—a lady with
strong opinions.” Jack has always been such a gentleman. Calling
Mama “a lady with strong opinions” was like calling a lion an
animal that might hurt you if you poke it with a sharp stick.

“I’m calling her tonight before she hears the
big news from the gossip network she’s permanently wired into.” I
didn’t know how the network operated, but I could bet money Mama
would find out about my new job in the next twenty-four hours even
if I didn’t tell her. “She’s going to do her utmost to foster a
world class guilt trip right through the center of my soul.”

The ever-attentive Emmie trudged in our
direction bearing the coffeepot on a tray, and this time my bladder
threatened to create an embarrassing scene if I didn’t behave
sensibly. I tried to wave her off, but she didn’t stop.

“Sure about that pecan pie?” she asked,
balancing the tray against her hip. You’d think the girl made a
commission on every slice.

We declined more coffee and the pie and then,
after quick trips to our respective restrooms, came back and
lingered.

After the rest of the customers had left and
Emmie started putting away ketchup bottles and sending us pointed
glances, we paid and headed outside.

“I’m living in an apartment over the antique
shop across the street,” Jack said, waving toward the building. “I
bought a house that I have to renovate before I move in. But let me
walk you to your car.”

“It’s okay. I’m parked a few blocks over in
front of Nancy’s Yoga Center.”

“Jack Maxwell is a true gentleman who would
not let a lady walk unescorted to her waiting carriage.” He
casually took my hand in his. His skin felt warm and rough. A
shiver went through me and I realized I couldn’t remember the last
time a man had held my hand. Certainly T. Chandler hadn’t.
Handholding was not his style.

We meandered down the sidewalk, past antique
and art stores, threading our way between groups of people. It was
late September and still tourist season. In fact, it’s always
tourist season in Charleston. A gray horse pulling a carriage
clopped along the street beside us while the young man at the reins
pointed out historic landmarks to the family riding behind him on
the wooden seats. I wondered if the job got boring after a week or
two of piloting the horse around the same streets every day. I was
sure the animal had the route memorized and all the driver had to
do was make sure it stopped for red lights and didn’t break into a
tourist-jolting gallop.

Jack paused to study the carriage. “You ever
ride in one of those?”

I started to say no, but all at once a dim
memory surfaced. I was five years old and my father had taken me
out for ice cream. Afterward he lifted me onto the wooden bench of
a carriage pulled by a sleek-coated black horse. When the ride was
over, Daddy took me to the front and held me up while I tangled my
tiny fingers in the coarse mane and filled my nostrils with pungent
horse smell. I asked him if we could take it home, cried when he
said we didn’t have room for a horse in my bedroom. But he’d
remembered and bought me a Breyer model horse, a bay Arabian with
an exquisite head, for my sixth birthday.

“Yes, a long time ago,” I said, my voice gone
soft and my mouth pulling itself into a smile.

“From your expression, I’d say you enjoyed
yourself.”

“I did.” It was the last time Daddy ever took
me out for ice cream. He’d promised to take me again the week after
my birthday, told me to be a good girl and help Mama in the house,
and we’d go that evening. I wasn’t a good girl that day. I fussed
at Mama because she wouldn’t let me watch cartoons and I didn’t
pick up my toys. Being a Daddy’s spoiled little girl, I thought I
could talk him into taking me out anyway.

I never got the chance. He died of a heart
attack at work. For years afterward, I blamed myself, as children
do. I thought if I’d only done everything I could to help Mama that
day, then Daddy would have come home the way he promised.

“You okay?” Jack asked, pulling me back from
the curb to stop me from stepping into the road against the
light.

I swallowed hard and looked up at him,
blinking myself back to the present. “I didn’t mean to disappear on
you.”