P Deutermann - Darkside

On the other hand, he’d done nothing to stop his daughter, Julie, from falling under the same romantic delusions about the Academy. Absent his father’s political connections, Julie had made it through the grueling admissions process pretty much on her own merits, although it didn’t hurt her admissions package that Ev was an alumnus and faculty member. He remembered vividly her comment during parents’ weekend, four years ago now, when she had described the downer from the huge victory of getting an appointment to spending the entire first night in Bancroft Hall learning how to stencil her plebe summer whites. He had experienced the very same feelings, and could still smell the stencil ink and hear the upperclassman screaming at him to wash his ink-stained hands, something he’d been trying to do for an hour.

And then Joanne died, he thought, pressing a hand on the smooth fabric of the sofa. Just like that, he realized, his eyes blinking. His whole life here, his normal, post-Navy, happy, real life, had begun with his father’s sudden death. And then his mother’s. And then Joanne’s. Viewed one way, his ultimate homecoming to Annapolis had been a veritable chronology of death. This thought had been at the back of his mind during their entire dinner, and at times, Liz’s bright conversation and upbeat attitude had cast a surreal haze around his own thoughts. Liz had skillfully urged him to open up, he realized now, offering small tidbits about her own past, her two ex-husbands, and the challenges of being single at her age. He could not help but notice how other men in the crowded restaurant watched her smile and play with her hair and envied him sitting there, getting her full attention. Despite his emotional fragility, Liz had grown on him, filling his senses and attention. Even so, he’d felt like he was walking through a waking dream, not knowing quite what was coming next but increasingly willing to go forward and see.

Liz came back into the living room. She’d brought a tray with scotch, Drambuie, two snifters, a small sharp knife, a heavy spoon, an ice bucket, and a lemon. She put the tray on the coffee table, tapped a remote to ignite the gas fire in the fireplace, turned on one more table lamp, and sat down at the other end of the sofa. She was wearing a silk pantsuit, and she’d done something to her hair while out in the kitchen. Adjectives tumbled through his thoughts: lovely, warm, smart, sexy, sweet. He felt his cheeks warming just a little when he realized he was staring.

“We’re in luck,” she announced, arranging the things on the tray. “I even had the lemon.”

He smiled but didn’t say anything, suddenly not willing to trust his voice. A familiar feeling was gathering in his chest.

“So, a Rusty Nail,” she said. “One half scotch, one half Drambuie, which I think is scotch-based, and a twist of lemon peel, all over cracked ice. That how you remember it?”

“Yes,” he mumbled. “It’s been awhile, though.” For everything, he thought. And then: I shouldn’t have come here.

“I’ve found a lot of bartenders don’t even know how to make one of these,” she said, cracking ice cubes against her palm with the back of the heavy spoon. “But they’re supposed to be a lot more hangover-proof than most after-dinner drinks.” She cracked ice into each snifter, then sliced off a scrape of lemon peel and squeezed the rind side over the ice, filling the air with the pungent smell of citron. Then she poured equal measures of the liquors and passed one snifter over to him. “Here you go,” she said. “Long life.”

He tipped snifters with her and then they both sat there, holding their drinks, facing each other on the sofa, with the fireplace flickering nearby. He sampled the drink and pronounced it perfect.

“Thank you,” she said. “It’s been a lovely evening. Thanks for dinner, even though it was supposed to be my treat.”

“Your company was treat enough, and it has been very nice,” he said. He tried to ignore the tightness in his chest, then found himself nodding absently as if to confirm what he’d just said. He looked into the fire.

Hey, look at her, he thought, not at the damned fire. He caught a glimpse of her out of the corner of his eye as she crossed her legs slowly, letting the expensive silk rustle suggestively. He felt the skin on his face tighten just as his chest had, and he knew, just knew, he was going to lose it. It made him so damned mad, but he couldn’t help it. He shouldn’t have come back to her house; it was too soon, much too soon. And then the tears came, and he felt like a perfect goddamned fool as he put the drink down on the table, trying not to drop it or spill it, and lowered his chin while tears streamed down his face. In a moment, she was there, her perfume filling the air around his face. Her arm was around him and she was saying in her soft voice, “It’s all right, all right, let it come. Don’t be afraid, just let it come.” And then he folded into her and cried his heart out.

After awhile, he took a deep breath, sat up, and muttered an apology. He was afraid even to look at her. He wanted to wipe the tears off his face, and his hands fumbled, looking for a Kleenex.

“For what, Ev?” she said, handing him some cocktail napkins. “For feeling awkward about being here? Unfaithful to her memory? For getting ambushed by memories?”

“For spoiling the evening,” he said. “And for watering down this great Rusty Nail.”

She laughed quietly and handed him some more napkins. He wiped his face and blew his nose, then tried to figure out what to do with the napkins. Finally, he stuffed them in his pants pocket. He looked over at her. She was sitting back now, both hands wrapped around her snifter. Her eyes were enormous.

“I can’t get it right,” he said, “this getting-over-it business. It’s been almost two years, and you’re the first woman I’ve spent any time with since…since-”

“Since she died,” Liz prompted.

“Yes. Since she died. I can’t even say it unless someone else says it first. Kind of pathetic, isn’t it? And you are so very attractive. You’re smart, fun, beautiful, and yet I kept asking myself all evening, what are you doing here? I mean me, not you. What am I doing here with someone like you? I should be home in my hole, feeling sorry for myself.”

“Instead of out here in the world, feeling like an interloper?”

“Yeah, exactly. I think Julie would be really upset if she knew I was here, for instance.”

“Why? Does she think life is off-limits for you now that your wife is gone?”

“Something like that. She wouldn’t say it, but she’d let me know it.”

“You know, I doubt that. She seems more mature than that. Besides, life alone is a dreary proposition.”

“So I’ve discovered. And it’s not like-well, I mean, it wasn’t as if marriage to Joanne had been heaven on earth all the time, either. We had a good, solid marriage. With all that entails in real life.”

“You apparently did better than I did. And I got two shots at it.”

He sipped some of the drink, resisting the impulse to gulp it down. “We used to keep score on that,” he said. “Joanne and I. Like we were somehow superior to people who got divorced. Joanne would tell me some couple was splitting up, and we’d shake our heads. Like it was such a pity that other people couldn’t manage what we’d managed. And then that little devil voice would say, What would it be like, I wonder, to split up, to start over with someone new?”

“Ever say that out loud?”

“Oh, hell no.”

“I did, you see. Worked like a charm, actually.”

He smiled. “Julie changed after it happened. Grew up a little. Seemed more like an adult young woman than a college kid. And I saw less of her. She’d go out of town on weekends instead of coming home. After the first six months, I felt sort of cut out of her life. I’m guessing she got close to a guy and preferred to lean on him rather than on me.”