Jennifer Greene: Sunburst

Morgan went out of his way to be entertaining throughout dinner. The wine flowed freely and the steaks were delicious; Erica and Kyle alternately praised and teased the chef. They were all more relaxed by the end of the meal. Erica mellowed as Kyle seemed to, feeling a glow of warmth inside every time her husband laughed at Morgan’s deliberate and sometimes outrageous wit. It was the first genuine laughter she had seen in him in an age, and she noticed, too, as they rose from the dinner table, that the weariness and tension had left his features.

“I wish to hell you’d get tired of her,” Morgan complained lazily to Kyle as he drew his arm around Erica’s shoulders in a hug, urging her down the steps to the living room. “And if I haven’t told you recently,” he added to Erica, unvarnished deviltry in his brown eyes, “I’ll give up the whole bit-wine, women and song-the day you divorce him.”

He meant Kyle to hear his comment. Morgan’s nonsense was nothing new to either of them. “It’s the best offer I’ve had all day,” Erica assured him dryly. “If I weren’t attracted to men with blue eyes-”

“Thanks,” Morgan complained. “It’s not as though I offer marriage every day of the week, and to be rejected because of-”

“You used to offer once a month, Morgan.” She pressed an affectionate kiss on his cheek to apologize for extricating herself from his hold. Banter was an integral method of communication for Morgan, and Erica expected it of him; yet for some reason the way he had held her, hip-to-hip, had grated in an unfamiliar manner. There was something so deliberate, so calculated about it. Not for the first time, she thought, remembering an earlier impression that Morgan wore his sexuality like a fashionable coat, bright in color to draw attention and a walking advertisement for the luxury of the fabric. He really couldn’t help it.

Morgan nestled down in an easy chair with a contented sigh, surveying first Erica and then Kyle, who had followed just behind them. “You haven’t said a word,” he accused Kyle casually. “I take it you don’t mind if I steal Erica away from you? You don’t deserve her, you know.”

Kyle stretched in the opposite chair, propping his long legs on an ottoman. His head rolled back as if the meal had depleted his last vestiges of energy, and he laced his fingers behind his neck. “Don’t carry your kidding too far, okay, Morgan?” he said mildly. “I’d hate to have to worry about taking you seriously one of these days.”

There was something in his tone… Erica could not look at him suddenly. From out of nowhere, a strange friction had stolen into the room, and now it crackled around both men.

You’re crazy, she told herself as she poured them coffee and set the cups on the table between them. She excused herself and went back to the kitchen to clean up. She did the job quietly, with half an ear to the conversation just below. The subject was politics while she washed and dried the dishes, and solar energy by the time she’d cleaned the counters, watered the hanging plants and generally puttered about the kitchen.

The friction had disappeared. They talked the way they had always talked, man to man, with a firm respect for each other and a wary sharing of perspective. Wary, because the two men were competitive as all hell, a fact that continually amused Erica. She could not imagine having a female friend with whom competition was the basis of the friendship; yet between the men it was fundamental.

She leaned over the counter when the chores were done, idly watching the scene below. Morgan was stretched out with his arms behind his head and one knee crossed over the other, a foot tapping rhythmically in the air. Morgan didn’t know how to be still. When he talked, some part of his body talked as well. He was openly irritated when Kyle was right; Kyle was often right, and then Morgan’s foot went back and forth like a hand fan on a hot day.

Kyle gave nothing away by such body language. His legs were stretched out, bare feet crossed at the ankles, the sleeves of his dark sweatshirt pushed up above his elbows revealing the thick dark hair that curled on his arms under the glow of the lamp. His face was in shadow; his jeans were stretched tight across his thighs. He was absolutely still except for his eyes, in which Erica saw a razor-sharp perception. He missed nothing. Kyle inhaled life, took everything in. Morgan picked up a single emotion at a time and lived it until the next one came along.

The differences between the two men had always intrigued her, yet Erica sighed, feeling a wave of fatigue as the hour grew late. She and Kyle had both been up since six. She moved down the three steps to settle on the couch with a cup of coffee, doubting that it would effectively keep her awake. Morgan smiled at her, immediately changing the conversation as he rose to offer her a glass of kirsch.

“I still haven’t figured out what you two are up to,” Morgan said to Kyle. “I knew you were coming back here after your father died and that it was going to take some time to take care of everything. I guess I just assumed that you meant to sell the place. Not…dig in here.”

A moment passed before Kyle answered. For the first time, it occurred to Erica that Morgan had always been the one who was quick to confide, that Kyle had always been the one to bolster his friend in a crisis instead of the other way around. “I always did swear I’d never come back here,” he admitted finally, leaning his head back. “But before my father died, I promised him… Hell, Shane, it doesn’t matter.” He hesitated, masking a sudden brooding look as he stood up and turned away to pour himself a drink. “We’re back here, indefinitely. That’s all.”

“But neither one of you can possibly want to settle in a town this small. I can’t imagine what Erica finds to do here. And, Kyle, I thought you never got on with your father. You used to talk about this woodworking business as if you thought it was the pits.”

“I used to think that way,” Kyle agreed.

“You wanted money even more than I did. To get on top where no one could ever touch you. Success…”

“And I played that game for more than ten years.” Kyle suddenly smiled wryly. “You and I always thought exactly alike, Shane. Get out of our way, world, because we’re going up! You were in competition with your father, I was running from the life my father led. It doesn’t matter. Maybe everyone has to get out of the race at some point.”

Morgan stared at him. “So you’re saying you just want a break, then. That I can understand. I thought you were talking about living here permanently.”

Kyle said very quietly, “I don’t know.” Leave it, his tone of voice urged. Now.

Erica sipped her kirsch, unsettled by Morgan’s probing. She knew nothing of a promise Kyle had made to his father, but she was acutely conscious that he had said nothing to Morgan about the debts Joel had left for them to pay off. More than that, she could see in Kyle the almost imperceptible change that seemed to come over him whenever someone mentioned his father. A slight stiffening of his shoulders, a chill replacing the warm and vibrant expression in his eyes… As though he were haunted by guilt, she thought, when that just couldn’t be. Kyle had been a wonderful son to Joel, generous and concerned. They had lived some distance apart, of course…

“…covered with stain and her hands full of paint thinner!” Morgan was laughing.

“I can’t keep her out of it.” Kyle’s brooding blue eyes flickered to hers. “You should see some of the projects she’s taken on.”

“ Now I’m beginning to get the picture,” Morgan said, grinning. “The lady’s the monkey wrench you hadn’t expected to find in the works, Kyle? Maybe it’s the image of raising kids in the country-”