Jennifer Greene - Man From Tennessee

“I don’t believe this conversation!”

“I don’t believe you just went through a red light.”

Her eyes flickered anxiously to the rearview mirror, and he burst into laughter when she shot back daggers at him. It was the first red light she had ever run in her life.

“I wouldn’t have wanted you to wear it in public anyway,” he consoled.

“If I had wanted to wear something like that, I would have worn it whether or not you or anyone else approved,” she said snappishly.

“I see. You’re going to argue no matter what I say.” He sighed. “And I suppose the next thing you’re probably thinking to do is to go back to the shop to get it. Just to prove I’m wrong.”

He had an unforgivable understanding of her exact frame of mind. Belatedly she realized that Kern had not worried about the entire pile of clothes. It was that little lemon confection at the bottom that he had staged to unsettle her. Or was it to find out if she really was the same prudish, self-conscious little nitwit she used to be? Somehow, it mattered that he believed she had changed, really changed. It was a question of pride.

“You misunderstand, Kern,” she said more calmly. “I have no real objections to the suit-only to wearing something like it in a public place, like the swimming hole by the camp where there are so many strangers. Of course if you consider that prudish, I have to admit…” She shrugged carelessly, and followed his motioning hand to the parking-lot entrance near the restaurant.

“But one-on-one is just fine, is that it, Tish?”

His voice told of his displeasure, and for no reason as far as she could surmise. She sighed, giving up. She did not understand the man or his attitude. But she was exceedingly hungry.

The restaurant was new to her. Huge from the outside, from within it was divided into at least half a dozen smaller dining rooms. Neither of them was dressed formally, but Kern chose to lead them to a small, hushed room in the back. Blood-red linen tablecloths and flickering candles graced each table. The menus were impressively two-feet long, and Trisha promptly hid behind hers.

For a few minutes they were both quiet, and in spite of herself Trisha found that she was relaxing. Perhaps it was the pent-up sigh from the other side of the table that signaled a truce, and finally Kern spoke from behind his menu. “Are we going polite or are we going for fingers, Tish?”

She could not help a smile as she peered around the menu. “Fingers.”

“Fine.” He closed the menu, took hers from her, and set them aside. “You’re having frog legs and I’m having lobster. There’s really no need to look at the rest of the list.” He paused, a small flame in his eyes from the reflection of the candle. “I’m already picturing you in one of those big bibs…”

“And I’m picturing you with your beard, managing lobster dripping with butter,” she quipped back.

They both ate without a lot of talk, devouring their favorite delicacies as if starved. A small decanter of white wine was placed between them and was nearly empty by the time they finished. There was the sound of laughter and muted conversation from the other rooms, but the small dining area they claimed was virtually empty except for the two of them. When the bibs and bones and shells and debris from their meal were removed, the dark-coated waiter served coffee, and they both leaned back in their chairs, replete to the point of a lazy kind of tiredness.

“Ready?” Kern asked finally, and she nodded. His arm brushed the small of her back as they walked from the restaurant, and when they reached the car Kern slipped into the driver’s seat. Taking control, she thought fleetingly, the way Kern found it hard not to take control of a setting. At the moment it just didn’t matter. She was too full, feeling perfectly lazy, to let anything matter. She slipped down in the passenger seat, resting her head against the back, half closing her eyes as he started the engine. The torrential rain had finally stopped and night had descended on the valley. They were through the flashing neon lights of the town in minutes and back on the mountain road that invoked an intense, peaceful quiet.

“I haven’t seen you wear the sling since yesterday,” she commented idly.

Kern smiled ruefully. “Ted told me the wrist would have healed a week ago if I’d just done what he told me. The sling was a penance that afternoon for overdoing it. Bothered by my driving, Tish?”

“Of course not,” she said sleepily. “You drove the truck earlier, Kern. Besides, you wouldn’t take the wheel if you couldn’t handle it.”

He glanced at her. “Blind trust used to be your specialty,” he chided.

She looked back at him, and then away, silent the rest of the half-hour drive. Blind trust had been the instinct from the moment she met him, she couldn’t deny it. Though, thank God, she wasn’t naive any longer. But that trust, she realized, was still there. She did trust Kern and his integrity. She couldn’t really say the same for anyone else she’d ever known in her life.

On the way up the long drive to his place, Kern turned the car midway, taking a narrow gravel road she was unfamiliar with. “Where?” she asked.

“To walk off a bit of dinner, if you don’t mind.”

“I…no.” She stepped out of the car stiffly, aware of Kern and the fact that they were alone. Somehow in all the worry over Julia she had failed to remind herself that staying at his place meant staying alone with him for the two nights.

“This way.”

He helped her over a rocky patch, and then his hand fell away, leaving her to set her own pace ahead of him. Trees rustled on her left, but the path followed a stream on the right, a gurgling rush of silver in the moonlight, a sprinkling of stars overhead reflected in the water. Wildflowers crouched low all around the banks, a sweet, potent, night-rich scent after the rain.

They walked without talking. The darkness made for a meandering pace, but it was not pitch black. The rain had cooled the sultry heat of the day, just a faint warm breeze rippling the stream. When she tired of walking, she wandered to a low flat rock that jutted over the water and perched on it with her legs crossed, bending to look in the stream.

Kern stopped just behind her, leaning back against the rough-barked surface of a hickory tree in the shadow. She glanced back once, all too aware of him, but he seemed no more inclined to talk than she did. Every limb gradually relaxed as she simply stared out over the water, absorbing the scene. The restfulness was so different from the city life she’d adjusted to-the life she had convinced herself was all and exactly what she wanted. But the convincing had taken a long time.

Finally she stood back up and dusted off her pants. She looked again to Kern. He hadn’t moved. His eyes had a gleam in the dusty shadows beneath the tree. She felt uneasy.

“You accused me of playing with you before.”

She nodded, pushing her hair back where the breeze was trying to curl it to her cheeks.

“I knew we’d see each other again sometime, Tish. For the first year after you left, I probably would have slammed the door in your face if you had come back.” He stepped out from the shadows toward her, and she dug her hands in her pockets. “It took a long time to accept failure. I blamed you first and then me…and then no one. There was certainly no way to take back those six months, was there?”

She shook her head, and he added quietly, “You were very young, Tish. I knew sooner or later I would want to know what you would be like when you grew up.”

She took a breath, still staring at him. “I kept expecting you to ask for a divorce.”

“I want children. If I’d found someone along the way I’d wanted to have children with, I would have gotten a divorce. Until then, it didn’t really matter.”