Muriel Jensen - Man In A Million

She made a face at him. “Prue ate it when she drove last night.”

He laughed. “You mean, she denies you but eats it herself?”

“She can,” she said. “She’s very petite. It’s that yellow house.”

She pointed to a big bungalow with a private dock and a considerable amount of lakefront. He pulled into a short driveway with yellow chrysanthemums on both sides.

Prue, wearing overalls and a broad-brimmed sun hat, was weeding the beds. She looked up in surprise, then stood as he pulled up to the rear steps.

“Isn’t she like a cover of Better Homes and Gardens magazine?” Paris asked. “Dressed in grubbies and somehow still a picture.”

He had to agree. “She’s a very attractive woman. But so are you. And while confidence is sexy, there’s something about vulnerability that’s very appealing.”

She looked at him in surprise.

“What happened?” Prue asked, putting the basket and scissors down at the sight of Paris’s pale face. Then she noticed the Berkshire Cab sign on the strange car. “Where’s the wagon?”

Paris explained briefly about the accident. “The wagon’s going to be in the shop for a couple of days, so Randy’s lending us his car.”

“That’s very kind of you.” She gave Randy a knowing look, as though suspecting his interest in her sister motivated his kindness. Then she returned her attention to Paris. “But are you okay? Have you seen a doctor?”

Paris started for the house, telling her sister about the trip to the emergency room. Then she seemed to remember him.

He was wondering if he was going to have to walk home when she studied him consideringly, then drew a deep breath. “I’m going to make him a sandwich, then you can take him home when you start your shift.”

She glanced at her watch. “I’d better start early. We have a Wednesday afternoon regular, don’t we? Two-thirty?”

Paris put a hand to her forehead and groaned. “I forgot! The Lightfoot sisters and their weekly tea party with Mariah at Perk Avenue.” The Lightfoot sisters ran the Maple Hill Manor School where Mariah once worked. “And I was congratulating myself on having picked a slow afternoon to have an accident. No calls backed up on the cell phone.”

“Not a problem.” Prue snatched the phone and whipped the sun hat off her head. “I’ll take over now, then you can call me when Randy’s ready to go home. I like it when you owe me.” Then she used her hat to point at the box in Paris’s hands. “Is that chocolate?”

Paris clutched it to her and her expression grew firm. “They were a gift from Randy when he picked me up at the hospital. You can trust me with them. We made a deal.”

Prue nodded, looking unconvinced. “All I ask is that you remember the red dress.”

“I will, I will,” Paris promised.

With a doubtful look back at her sister, and a scolding look for Randy, Prue hurried off to the house.

Paris beckoned him to follow her.

The house looked like a place occupied by three women, though it had none of the colonial or sometimes Victorian air with which many of the locals decorated their homes. It was all bright colors and floral patterns in the upholstery and the curtains, lending it a sort of patio flavor. He wondered if the women’s mother had tried to bring Southern California with her when she followed her husband here.

They walked into a living room that was painted bright red with white farm-style furniture upholstered in a slate-blue fabric covered with red-and-cream flowers. A coordinating plaid covered a fainting couch and another chair.

He heard Prue run up the stairs while Paris led the way into a huge cream-colored kitchen that looked very up-to-date. The cupboards had wire-mesh fronts, and several bottom ones were fitted with basket bins for produce. An old-fashioned iron stove attracted his attention, but upon closer inspection, he noticed that what appeared to be a wood box was really just an extension of a very large oven, and it wasn’t iron at all, just designed to appear to be. The refrigerator and the dishwasher matched with the same convex black panels and gold filigree trim.

A long work island in the middle of the room boasted a small sink on one end and stools on the far side.

This made his Spartan apartment look even more basic, and muddled his impression of Paris and her mother and sister as three women struggling to get by.

“Wow,” he said simply.

She had opened the refrigerator door and turned to peer at him in question.

He spread his arms to indicate the room. “I have a corridor kitchen that’s about eight feet long with barely room to turn around. This is very elegant.”

She nodded. “My dad was very handy,” she said, then with a quick frown, corrected herself. “You know. Jasper. Prue’s dad. My…stepdad, I guess.” Then she seemed to tire of deciding what to call him and just went on. “He loved to putter in his spare time and Mom always had an idea of how to make things more useful and more beautiful. She has a real gift for decorating.”

“I’ll say.”

“Turkey and Swiss, or ham and cheddar?” She held up deli packs of lunch meat.

He went toward her. “Is ham and Swiss out of the question?”

“Unorthodox,” she replied, selecting those from her collection, “but not out of the question. Whole wheat or sourdough?”

“Whole wheat.”

“Grilled or cold?”

“Cold. Can I do anything to help?”

She pointed to the work island. “Just pull up a stool and relax. We can eat out on the deck. It’s my favorite place.”

He obeyed. She seemed to be relaxing and he didn’t want to do anything to interrupt the process.

She made the sandwiches quickly and efficiently while standing opposite him at the work island. She added a bread-and-butter pickle to each plate, then pulled a face at him. “Ordinarily, I’d add potato chips to this, but in view of the red dress, we’d better make it carrot sticks.”

“I’m not wearing the red dress,” he teased.

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You mean, you’d make me watch you eat chips while I have to eat carrot sticks?”

“Depends.” He was suddenly aware of an angle he could work. “Do I have some sort of stake in this dress?”

She looked confused. “I don’t understand.”

“Well, it occurs to me that I could support your effort to get in shape for this notorious red dress,” he bargained, “if you’ll go somewhere with me while you’re wearing it. Bearing in mind that I don’t think training’s really necessary. I think you look pretty terrific already.”

She tried to withhold a smile at the compliment but didn’t quite succeed. She pretended to concentrate on cutting the sandwiches at an angle. “It’s for the fashion show,” she said.

He nodded. “I understand that. But we could go somewhere after the show.”

She put the knife down and frowned at him. “Why are you doing this,” she asked, “when you were so determined to avoid me while Addy was trying to get us together?”

“Simple,” he answered. “I hadn’t met you then.”

She handed him two cans of diet soda, then, carrying the plate, led the way onto the deck.

It had a magnificent view of Maple Hill Lake. It was absolutely quiet at the moment, nothing moving on it but a family of mallards several yards away. The afternoon sun shone brightly on it, bees hummed, and water lapped against the dock with a sound he’d always found quieting. The breeze was a little cool as fall took hold.

They settled onto a canopied glider fitted with cup holders. He put a soda can in each hole, and she placed the plate between them on the blue-and-yellow upholstered seat.

“But everyone who knows you,” she went on, continuing their conversation from the kitchen, “says you’re not interested in a relationship.”