Jennifer Greene - Man From Tennessee

“I hear you,” she said softly, and turned on her side in the darkness. The hurt was sudden, swift and painful.

It never occurred to her that there might be another interpretation of his words. She heard only what she was really expecting to hear. He would never ask her to stay because he had really never wanted her back, not as a wife again. As long as she was here, of course, her own behavior had given him license to make love with her. But as far as her staying…it was not his choice. She was not surprised his love had died. There was no blame for Kern, only the anguished wish that she had never come.

Wet eyes dried in the darkness. A long time later Kern half stirred in sleep, one leg draping over hers, his arm cradled between her breasts. A breeze coaxed in coolness, the special quiet of a mountain night. The last of her mountain nights, she thought fleetingly. She suddenly wished that she’d told Kern how she saw him as a lover. Sensitive, fierce, gentle. It seemed terribly important to tell him that it wasn’t his fault she had not responded a long time ago…it was important, because she knew there would be no other time.

Impeded by the weight of Kern’s arm on her hip, she half sat up in the darkness, pulling off her nightgown. Her breasts felt hot and tender after the afternoon’s exposure to the sun. Crushed against his chest they felt painful, but an erotic pain that she welcomed. Her palm slowly skimmed over his sleep-warmed flesh, down his side and hips, back up over his taut buttocks and spine.

He half turned in sudden restless sleep. She slid lower, so that her lips were on a level with his heart. One of her slim legs tangled between his, holding him close as she sought to give him some of the love he had once so freely offered her. She hadn’t contemplated waking or even arousing him. She only wished to express what she had failed so badly to express before: his body was beautiful to her. She simply wanted him to know. Her lips grazed the warm skin of his chest, from the flat male nipples hidden in a curling matt of hair to the smoother flesh that covered his ribs. His skin was like warm satin.

“Tish…”

She reached up, her fingertips brushing his lips to silence him. His mouth was so soft next to the grainy texture of beard and her fingers explored the angle of his cheekbone, the shape of his broad forehead. Gently, slowly, she kissed each of his eyes closed again, and then crouched over him, trailing patterns of kisses, memorizing his throat and shoulders, his ribs and stomach. A fever started to consume her. A fever brought on by the darkness and silence, the feel and scent of his body. Her breasts burned and she felt light-headed. Perhaps it was just knowing he had wakened, yet when his palm slowly slid from her nape to the curve of her sun-heated breast, she flinched-not in rejection, but in almost painful, intense sensitivity. Not even that afternoon had desire been so compelling, so fierce.

Her hand kneaded restlessly, up and down his thigh. And Kern made a sudden deep growling sound from the bottom of his throat. He had been so obediently still, but no more. He opened his eyes before his mouth touched hers, then he rose and pressed her down onto the cool sheets. His hands felt like fire on her breasts, sweeping urgently down her ribs and stomach. Her whole body contracted as he caressed her thighs. Her hands clutched his hair and from her throat came a long low sound of pain. Love me, Kern, she wanted to cry. I can’t bear leaving you. Not now.

He was inside her before she could draw breath, her startled cry of pleasure blending with his. She wanted to obliterate every other thought but him, lose herself in their lovemaking. It was as if he knew how she felt. He rolled onto his back so she could be on top. He raised his head to lick at her sunburned breasts. But in the next instant she was beneath him again, his hands holding her hair, while his tongue parodied the love-play of their bodies. Finally, side by side, his palms cupped her bottom, urging her legs to fold around him. He whispered low, husky encouragements, urging a wanton response from her she hadn’t known she possessed. She heard Kern’s guttural cry just when the fever exploded inside her body in a long low rush.

He held her then, soothing her, his kisses gentle on her damp cheeks, in her hair. “So beautiful, Tish…” He held her long after they were both still, long after she finally heard the sound of his even breathing again. He held her as if he would never let her go.

“Patricia! This is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard of! You can’t simply take off like this. Put those things down and talk to me!” Julia stormed, snatching at the navy-and-emerald shorts on the bed that Trisha was not planning to take anyway. Trisha stood back erect from the suitcase, and sighed.

“I love you, Julia,” she said patiently, soothingly. “And Kern loves you as well. When you’re back north I’ll come and see you again, just as I’ve always done. Please don’t be upset.”

“You keep talking about me. I want to talk about you. Where is my son this morning?” Julia demanded fretfully.

“He’ll be back by lunch. He’s out with Matt. They’re checking out areas where dead trees have to be cut down. Normally they’d let them fall in the natural way, but with the weather so dry there’s the threat of forest fires-”

“I don’t give a hoot about all that!” Julia said snappishly.

“Well, you should. Kern does,” Trisha said wryly. She closed the suitcase with a snap and lifted it. The case was bulging. What wouldn’t fit in had been boxed and was already put away in the attic.

“You had an argument,” Julia said, probing. “You must have. You were both quiet last evening. But I thought everything was going fine-”

“Everything is fine,” Trisha said quietly and set down the case yet again to reach out and hug the older lady. “You would have liked it to turn out differently, I know that. I’m sorry, darling. But I can’t help…” His words had echoed through the long night, and settled that morning after he’d left: “I swore I’d never ask you to stay again…that ‘once’ said all I had to say…”

“At least stay until lunch. You’re looking too tired for that long drive, Patricia.” Julia trailed her down the stairs, through the kitchen, out the back door. Trisha set her suitcase on the backseat, reached up to readjust a pin at the back of her neat chignon and settled in the driver’s seat. The rest of Julia’s monologue she had blocked out. She had the sudden realization that she hadn’t the money to make the trip. She’d spent it on the outfit she’d worn the day they had picked up Julia from the hospital. The mauve pantsuit she wore today.

“Are you even listening to me?” Julia asked plaintively.

Trisha looked up from her wallet. There was a lone Gulf credit card. Could she make the entire journey on Gulf gas stations? She looked up at Julia, knowing she no longer felt free to ask for help. “No, I wasn’t listening, darling. My mind’s made up. Kern is not going to be upset, Julia; he is going to be furious for about an hour and a half, and then you’re going to find he’s completely relieved that I’m gone. There is nothing for you to worry about. Did you take your pills this morning?”

“I swear, if I’d raised you you wouldn’t have been able to sit down regularly!” Julia said, sputtering helplessly.

“Did you?” Trisha insisted.

“Yes.”

“Good. I know you’re upset. Just go in and put your feet up and relax. Right now. Or for the next four election years you’ll see me actively campaigning for the liberal party, Julia-”

The fleeting look of horror that transformed Julia’s features broke up her frantic monologue. She stiffened, expelling an exasperated breath. “Patricia, that is not amusing.”