Deena Goldstone - Surprise Me

“I can see the years of motherhood in your face.”

“Meaning I look older and haggard.”

“Meaning there’s a sort of…gravitas there now.”

“That’s good?”

“Yes, good. Beautiful, even.”

“Oh, Daniel.” And she sighs in pleasure and they grin at each other stupidly, just so glad to be sitting opposite each other, contemplating a meal together — the simplest of things, until Pauline interrupts, order pad in hand.

Daniel knew Pauline would be working tonight. She works every dinner shift except the Monday and Thursday nights she comes to his class. From the very first discussion she presented herself as direct and unstoppable, so he expects exactly what she says. “So who’s this now, Professor?”

There hasn’t been an instance in all the years Daniel has lived in Winnock that he’s brought a woman to dinner who looks like she could be a date. This one, however, Pauline sees immediately, is far too young for him, younger than his own daughter in all probability.

“Isabelle, Pauline. Pauline, Isabelle, one of my former students.”

“When you taught at college?”

“Chandler, in Los Angeles,” Isabelle fills in. “Daniel taught me how to write.”

Daniel shakes his head, deflecting the compliment, muted as it is.

“And so you’re a writer, too, then?” Pauline asks.

“No.” Isabelle looks carefully at Daniel as she says, “He didn’t teach me how to continue to write.”

“My fault,” Daniel says, and then, to override whatever next question Pauline is itching to ask: “Now, what are the specials tonight?”

Pauline points to the large blackboard next to the cash register, where “Chicken Pot Pie with Morels,” “Three-Alarm Chili,” and “Clam Up and Eat the Chowder” have been carefully lettered in chalk by Luca, whose job it is to cook the daily specials.

Daniel orders the chili, because he’s come to know that Luca is a gifted chef. There’s been talk of his going to the New England Culinary Institute in Montpelier, Vermont, but Daniel suspects that Aldo wants to hang on to him.

Isabelle orders the Yankee pot roast because she’s here in Yankee territory.

“Excellent choice,” Pauline tells her as she writes it down. And then, because she can’t leave without more conversation: “Do you know the Professor teaches a bunch of us, women only, it turns out, every Monday and Thursday night over at the adult school?”

“I’ve heard,” Isabelle says. And then, teasing Daniel again, “It gets him out of the house. A good thing.”

“We read novels and discuss them. Sometimes new books, sometimes the older ones that most of us never read in school, or else if we did, we’ve forgotten.” She shakes her head at the passage of time. “For all of us it’s been a while since we sat in a classroom, but that doesn’t stop us from having opinions.”

“And yours among the most vehement, Pauline.”

The tiny woman shrugs. “I know what I like.”

“That’s a good start,” Isabelle says, but she’s looking into Daniel’s eyes as she says it.

When Pauline leaves to deliver their order to the kitchen, Daniel leans forward across the table and Isabelle does, as well, and he says very quietly, “There are a lot of eyes watching us.”

Isabelle peeks at the few customers sitting at the counter, the two other couples in the booths down the line from them, even Luca behind the counter as he begins to ladle out Daniel’s chili, who all cast covert glances in their direction. Daniel with a stranger, a young stranger, an attractive stranger. My!

“Does it bother you?” Isabelle asks as quietly as she can.

“No,” Daniel says, and he sits back. “I’ve come to understand that people here are well-meaning.”

Isabelle sits back, too, and looks at him, really looks at him. And he allows it. He doesn’t flinch or deflect her scrutiny. “This place suits you.”

“I believe that’s so.”

“There’s a part of you that isn’t struggling anymore.”

“Ah, Isabelle…” There it is again: her ability to see into his heart.

Isabelle drives them home along the same road she walked earlier that day, when she was consumed with anger. But not really at Daniel, she now knows. She needs to read the book again. She suspects it’s beautiful and that she’ll be proud of it. She’ll tell Daniel that later. She’ll try.

It’s pitch-black, the trees forming a tunnel of darkness, punctuated only by the car headlights as they sweep the scenery in front of them. They’re the only people on the road. They could be the last two people on the earth. Even the moon is hidden behind the tops of the trees.

Neither Isabelle nor Daniel speaks. They’ve never made small talk and they don’t now. He hasn’t asked about her son, and she hasn’t told him about her encounter with Alina. There isn’t room in the car for anyone else, just the two of them and the unspoken question between them. What will happen when they get back to Daniel’s cottage?

Daniel leads the way in, stooping a bit to fit beneath the low doorway. Isabelle follows. He turns on a small table lamp, which fills the low-ceilinged space with a soft warm glow, and they look at each other, waiting. And then Isabelle turns off the light and the room is lit only by moonlight reflecting off the surface of Foyle’s Pond and Daniel reaches for her.

They stand that way, with their arms around each other, her head against his neck, his hand in her hair, and they wait. For permission — no. For courage — maybe. But mostly to make sure this is right. They’ve given each other so much over the years, been each other’s lodestar. Are they risking all that now?

Isabelle moves first. She steps back from his embrace and takes his hand and walks them toward Daniel’s bed. Slowly they undress. Unhurriedly. There’s a different kind of urgency working here. It’s an undercurrent, a hum of desire, the imperative between them so different from her need for Casey’s body and the oblivion their sexual energy creates. No, this is something else.

She wants Daniel because she’s always wanted him and will always want him, she knows. Not to the exclusion of all else but to anchor her in some deep way.

They stand naked in front of each other in the dark room, their bodies silhouetted against the long windows, and it is Daniel who reaches out and brings Isabelle into his embrace.

She feels enveloped, safe, his substantial body so different from Casey’s lean muscles that it could be a different country. And when he kisses her now, she has no doubts, and he feels it, feels her body’s energy flow toward him, and he smiles in the dappled darkness.

“At long last…”

“Oh, Daniel — it’s been forever.”

And they lie next to each other on Daniel’s unadorned bed and touch the parts of each other they’ve yearned to touch and stroke each other until Daniel moves on top of her and enters her at the exact moment she thinks she’ll die if he doesn’t and there’s a tenderness to it. And a gratitude that carries them through.

“Oh my God,” she whispers as they finish, and Daniel rolls them both onto their sides, their faces inches apart, their arms still wrapped around each other.

“ ‘Oh my God’ in a positive sense?”

“Daniel — you know.”

And he does. He knows that they’ve waited six years for this night and that it has been worth the wait.

—

DANIEL WAKES JUST AS THE SKY is lightening to the sound of Orphan scratching at his door. Carefully he disentangles his limbs from Isabelle’s, grabs his jeans, the dog’s bowl and food, and steps outside the cabin. It’s freezing, but he knows that if he lets Orphan in, he will wake Isabelle, and it’s too early.