"Envious?" he asked incredulously. "How could you be envious of these rural folk? You've traveled the world several times over, been introduced to royalty, earned a helluva lot of prize money in addition to what you make on endorsements.
You couldn't possibly build a trophy room large enough to hold all that you've received."
"None of which I can confide my troubles to.
I can't curl up with a trophy on cold nights. Or even have a healthy fight with one."
"Know what this sounds like to me? Whining." 'That's exactly what it is," she retorted crossly.
He let a moment go by before asking, "Are you regretting some decisions, Stevie?"
"Yes. No. I don't know, Judd. It's just that…" She paused, trying to convert her random thoughts into understandable language.
"For the past three years, the Grand Slam has eluded me by one tournament. Once I had got it,
I planned to slow down. I would have had to anyway in a year or two because of my advancing age, but I had already decided that if I got the Grand Slam I wouldn't ask for more. I'd retire on top, with dignity and a very respectable career behind me."
Pensively she continued, "But I didn't think much beyond that. Now that the inevitable future is here, it seems so bleak, so empty. There's nothing in it. There's nobody in it."
"No baby."
"No baby," she repeated emotionally. "And probably no chance of having one. Ever." ' 'Do you wish you had had a child sooner?" ' 'Maybe. But hindsight is twenty-twenty, isn't it?"
"With whom, Stevie?"
She laughed mirthlessly. "Good question.
With whom? I never took the time to fall in love, get married, develop a meaningful relationship.
I'm not even certain what that catch phrase means or how it applies to me and members of the opposite sex."
"Now that you've got the time to find out, you might not get the opportunity. Is that what's bothering you?"
"In a nutshell, yes.'
Each fell silent. Judd was the first to speak.
"Sometimes our decisions are forced on us."
"Mine weren't. I freely made my choice years ago. I chose tennis. At all costs, I wanted to be the number one player in the world."
"You are."
"I know. I also know I have no reason to complain. It's all been wonderful." She gave him a bleak smile. "It's just that every once in a while, like today, I'm reminded of everything I sacrificed and start feeling sorry for myself. Now that my career is coming to an end, I'm asking myself, 'now what?'. And I don't have any answers."
She took a deep breath. "In my estimation, self-pity is the most wicked of sins. It's also a big waste of time, unless it's within one's power to bring about a change. In my case," she concluded, laying a hand on her tummy, "I don't have control over the situation. That's the bitterest pill to swallow."
They had finished their meal. Judd helped her clean up the dishes. In that respect, he wasn't nearly as chauvinistic as he pretended to be.
"I'm going on up to bed," she told him as soon as they'd finished the chore.
"To brood?"
"No, because melancholia is exhausting."
He smiled crookedly. "Personally I think there are a lot of sins far more wicked than self-pity.
Want me to enumerate a few I've engaged in, just so you'll feel better?"
"Thank you, no. I'll pass."
He pressed her shoulders between his hands and dropped a quick kiss on her forehead. "Say your prayers. And close your door so the typewriter won't bother you."
"It doesn't bother me."
She stood looking up at him, feeling lost and lonely. She wished for something. For what exactly, she wasn't sure. For starters she wished that his good-night kiss had been placed on her mouth rather than her forehead. She wished it had been deep and lingering instead of light and quick. She wished his caress hadn't been so fraternal and that he hadn't removed his hands from her shoulders so soon.
She was seized by a strange and powerful yearning that she couldn't put a name to. It was silent and internal, but as strong and overwhelming as a waterfall. She longed to rest her cheek against Judd's chest and feel the safe sanctuary of his arms closing around her. She wanted to hear his husky voice whispering encouragement into her ear, even if all he gave her were platitudes.
Before she submitted to the impulses tugging at-her, she needed to put space between herself and Judd. He might mistake her unnamed need for weakness. "Goodnight."
"G'night, Stevie."
She couldn't sleep. The day had been cloudy and muggy. Ordinarily her room was cool enough, thanks to the droning oscillating fan that stirred the evening air. She hadn't missed air conditioning a bit. Indeed, she liked watching the sheer curtains on the open windows billow and float on the breeze.
But tonight the curtains were hanging limply in the windows. There was no breeze. Even if the curtains had been doing their entrancing dance, she doubted it could have lulled her to sleep. She was restless. Her body needed sleep, but her mind wouldn't cooperate and let it come.
Suddenly it occurred to her why she couldn't sleep. Judd's typewriter wasn't clacking. Contrary to what he thought, the sound of its metallic tapping didn't keep her awake when he worked well into the early morning hours. It had become a reassuring sound, an indication that for once she wasn't spending the night alone in an otherwise empty house.
Throwing off the light muslin sheet, she padded over to her bedroom door, which was always kept open to allow the air to circulate through the house-a lesson she had learned from Judd, one which he remembered from spending summers on the farm with his grandparents when he was a boy. She listened. Nothing.
A quick peek into his bedroom revealed that he hadn't gone to bed yet. She moved to the head of the staircase and looked down. The light was burning in the dining room. He was still up, probably just taking a break. But she waited for several minutes, and he didn't resume typing.
Curious, and somewhat worried, she crept down the stairs and silently approached the dining room.
She caught him deep in thought. His pose was what she considered to be very "authoresque."
He sat, staring at the page in his typewriter, his hands folded over his mouth, elbows propped on the card table.
The sleeves of his white T-shirt had been cut out, though it looked more like they'd been chewed out. The armholes were ragged. He was wearing a pair of navy blue shorts.
His hair looked as though it had been combed with the yard rake she used in the flower beds around the house. One damp, dark lock had fallen over his brow. His feet, in laceless tennis shoes, were resting on the lowest rung of the straight chair. His spine was bowed.
Not wanting to disturb him, she backed away and turned toward the stairs without making a single sound.
"Stevie?"
She came up short and stepped back into the light of the open archway. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to distract you."
"Obviously you didn't."
"The muses aren't being kind tonight?"
"Those bitches." With his hair falling across his forehead, his face shadowed from above by the lamp on the table and below by his sprouting beard, he epitomized disreputability.
He looked temperamental and dangerous and… gorgeous. Something deep inside Stevie stirred and stretched, like a seed that had been planted in fertile soil and was now on the brink of germination.
"Why aren't you asleep?" He took a slurp of coffee she knew must be stone cold.
"I don't know." She lifted her hands awkwardly, then let them drop back to her sides. "I think I missed the sound of the typewriter. And the humidity is oppressive. As long as I'm up, I'll be glad to make some fresh coffee."