“You do that, honey. Son, you’re plannin’ on stayin’ and havin’ lunch with us, aren’t you?”
“Well, sir, ah…” With his hands already full of grocery bags, there wasn’t much Jimmy Joe could do but follow Mirabella with his eyes as she fled down the hallway with Amy in her arms.
In the kitchen with her parents, he had an attack of claustrophobia. The cheery room seemed too crowded with just the three of them in it, and yet he felt Mirabella’s absence so profoundly, it almost bordered on panic. He couldn’t shake the feeling he was losing her, that he was about to let everything he’d hoped for slip through his fingers, just when he’d had it in his grasp. Because he knew her. He knew exactly what she was doing right now, in there alone with her baby and her thoughts. Right now her rational, reasonable planner’s mind was telling her all the reasons why things wouldn’t ever work out between them; and in another minute, her stubborn, muleheaded, opinionated mind was going to set it all in concrete. And he knew that once Mirabella had made up her mind, there wasn’t anything on earth, short of a force of nature, that was going to change it. So if he was ever going to try to do it, he had better do it now.
He set the bags of groceries on the kitchen table as gently as he could, and with a muttered, “‘Scuse me, sir…ma’am,” dived through the doorway and headed off down the hall in the direction Mirabella had taken.
He found her in a back bedroom-the guest room, by the look of it, since he didn’t think Pete Waskowitz would have tolerated all those flowers, or the white priscilla curtains at the windows. There were a few of Mirabella’s clothes and lots of baby things lying around, a white bassinet beside the bed, and a baby blanket spread out on the comforter. The room smelled of baby powder and a just-changed diaper, which brought back all kinds of memories for him.
She was sitting in a chair near the windows, so engrossed in the baby at her breast, she didn’t notice him for a minute or two. He watched her-watched the play of rain shadows in her hair, the creamy-soft curve of her cheek as she bent over her child, the gentle smile no one else would ever see-and knew that he’d been right, and that he would love this woman and this child until he drew his last breath…and beyond that, until the end of time. It strengthened his resolve for what he had to do.
She gave a gasp of outraged modesty when she saw him, and yelped, “Jimmy Joe-go away!”
But he ignored her, and instead went to sit on the edge of the bed right opposite her, and leaned forward to watch her somberly with his hands clasped between his knees. Her eyes followed him, darkening with wariness, at first. But once she knew he wasn’t going to run blushing at the sight of her naked breast, she relaxed and accepted his presence, it seemed to him, with a kind of quiet pride. They sat like that in silence for a while, listening to Amy’s squeaky gulps and the whisper of the rain on the windowpane.
Then she shook her head, just slightly, and he saw her eyes fill with tears. “Jimmy Joe,” she said in a broken whisper, “what are you doing here?”
He’d had a thousand miles to prepare for this. He’d probably thought of a thousand different ways to say what he wanted to say-clever. intelligent ways. Every one of them went right out the window. With his heart in his throat and in his eyes, he finally looked at her and said it: “Marybell, I’ve come to take you home with me.”
Chapter 15
“That home cookin’s smellin’ awful good right now.”
I-40-Texas
He knew from her silence and sadness that she’d probably expected it, that she’d already guessed what he wanted to ask her. And that the tears in her eyes were there because she’d already convinced herself it wasn’t going to work.
Funny thing-he never once thought it had anything to do with her maybe just not feeling the same way about him that he did about her. Somehow, he knew she did. It was just a feeling he had, something to do with the way she looked at him, the way her lips clung to his when he kissed her, the way she trembled when he touched her. And then, she’d named her baby Amy.
“Jimmy Joe,” Mirabella whispered, “I can’t.” The ache inside her was so vast that she wondered as she gazed down at her daughter’s fat, contented little cheek, how she could not feel it, too.
“You say that a lot,” he said matter-of-factly. “So far you’ve been wrong every time.”
Since normally there was nothing Mirabella hated more than being told she was wrong, that should have been enough to launch her headlong into an argument with no holds barred. But now, since deep in her heart she wanted nothing more than to be wrong, all she could do was snap, “It wouldn’t work,” then clamp her mouth shut again and glare at him in stubbornness and confusion.
He took a deep breath and for a moment didn’t say anything, while she watched his eyes roam the room, touching briefly on her, on the baby at her breast, the rain-streaked window, the bassinet, as if searching for something that lay just…there-so near but always beyond his grasp.
Then his gaze came back to his hands, clasped between his knees, and he cleared his throat, lifted his eyes to hers and smiled his sweet, Jimmy Joe smile and said, “I’ve never been much good with words. I mean, I know a lot of words. I read-my mama tells me too much-and the words are all up there in my head, and I hear them sometimes when I’m drivin’ and I don’t feel like listenin’ to the radio or one of my books-on-tape. Words just flow along so easy, then, like a river. But when there’s something important I want to say, I don’t know, it’s like somebody throws up a dam, or somethin’, and all those words back up inside me, and the only ones that come through is just my usual trickle.”
He paused to grin, then shake his head and look down at his hands again. “See, I knew you’d have to argue with me. And I had about a thousand miles to think how I’d answer you. All the good reasons why, different as we are and crazy as it seems, I think I could make you happy. Now that I’m here, though…” He looked up at her, his smile slipping awry. “The minute I saw you, I knew I wasn’t gonna have the words. So I figure the best way is just to show you. So…Marybell, that’s why I’m askin’ you to come home with me to Georgia. So you can see for yourself who I am and what I’ve got to offer you. And then you can decide if it’s anything you want, or not. It’s up to you. So…what do you say? Will you come with me?”
Come with me… It’s up to you. Oh, God, what was happening to her nice, controllable, well-planned world? It was as if he’d suddenly come to her and said, “Hey, you want to fly to the moon? Here are the tickets-we leave in an hour!” The wild, the crazy, the impossible, was suddenly there within her reach-and she felt confused, terrified, paralyzed, her heart racing and her mouth as dry as sandpaper. She opened it, but no sound came out. The silence grew tense and viscous. And then…
“Oh, for heaven’s sake, Bella,” her mother said, “don’t be an idiot.”
They both turned to see her standing there, Amy’s infant carrier car-seat in one hand, the diaper bag slung over her shoulder. Jimmy Joe rose instantly, mumbling, “Ma’am,” as good manners dictated. Mirabella simply sat, dumbstruck, as Ginger dumped the baggage onto the rug and advanced with arms outstretched.
“Here-I’ll take that baby. You go get your coat.”
“But…she hasn’t been burped-”
“I’ll do it. Go and get yourself ready-now. This instant.”
Mirabella drew a sharp, reflexive breath as she saw her baby lifted from her arms, an instinctive preparation for battle. Then she caught Jimmy Joe’s quiet gaze and the exhalation sighed softly from her lips. “Yes, ma’am,” she murmured humbly.