Ease up, Delaware.
I looked in the rearview mirror. Headlights. Same ones? The glare prevented me from seeing who was inside.
Ridiculous. I was letting all the talk of plots and counter-plots go to my head.
“What’s wrong?” said Linda.
“Wrong? Nothing.”
“All of a sudden you’re all tensed up. Your shoulders are all crunched.”
The last thing I wanted to do was feed her anxiety. I consciously relaxed, tried to look more casual than I felt. Snuck another glance in the rearview mirror. Different set of headlights, I was pretty sure. A caravan of headlights, stretching for blocks. Typical weekend jam-up on Melrose…
“What is it, Alex?”
“Nothing. Really.” I turned off Melrose onto Spaulding and pulled a therapist switcheroo: “How about yourself? Still thinking about the car?”
“Got to admit I’m a little edgy,” she said. “Maybe we should have stuck to the boredom pledge.”
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I can get you bored again, really quick.” I cleared my throat and put on a whiny, pedagogical tone: “Let’s talk educational theory. The topic of the day is, ahem, curriculum adjustment. Macro- and micro-variables of a variety of contemporary text offerings that contribute to greater, ahem, student participation while holding constant class size, budgetary factors, and the, ahem, cement/asphalt ratio of the surrounding play areas in a suburban school prototype, as defined by-”
“All right, I believe you!”
“- the Harrumph-Pshaw Educational Coercion Act of 1973-”
“Enough!” She was laughing hard.
I looked in the mirror. No headlights. Stretched my arm across the seat and touched her shoulder. She scooted closer, rested a hand on my knee, then removed it. I put it back.
She laughed and said, “Now what?”
“Tired?”
“More like wired.”
“Want to help me hang the print?”
“That kind of like ‘come up and see my etchings’?”
“Same general idea.”
“Hmm.”
“Hmm what?”
“Hmm yes.”
I squeezed her shoulder, drove home feeling relaxed. Except for the two dozen times I checked my rearview mirror.
“I love everything about this place,” she said, stretching out on the leather sofa and undoing her hair. “The view, the pond- it’s simple but you’ve done a lot with it. Feels bigger than it is. How long have you been living here?”
“Almost seven years.”
“Out here that just about makes you a homesteader.”
“Got the wagon train out in back,” I said, holding up the Bellows. “How does this look?”
“Little to the left.” She got up. “Here, I’ll hold it. You take a look for yourself.”
We exchanged places.
She said, “What do you think?”
“Perfect.”
I measured, hammered the nail, hung the print, straightened the frame. We returned to the sofa and looked at it.
“Nice,” she said. “That’s a good place for it.”
I kissed her without restraint. Her arms went around me. We clinched till we lost breath. Her hand settled on my fly. Gently squeezing. I began unbuttoning her blouse, got two buttons loose before she said, “Whoa,” and lifted her hand.
“Something the matter?”
She was flushed and her eyes were shiny. “No, nothing… It’s just… every time we get together, we just do it? Bam?”
“Not if you don’t want to.”
The white lashes fluttered like down. She took my face in her hands. “You really that chivalrous?”
“Not really. But all that talk about your being a crack shot has me worried.”
She laughed. Turned serious just as quickly. “I just don’t want it to be… easy come, easy go. Like everything else in this town.”
“That’s not for me either.”
She looked uncertain, but kissed me again. Deeply. I got into it.
She squirmed.
I backed off. She pulled me closer, held me to her. My heart was racing. Or maybe it was hers.
“You want me,” she said, as if amazed at her own power.
“Oh, yeah.”
A moment passed. I could barely hear the gurgle of the pond.
“Oh, what the heck,” she said, and put her hand back.
21
I heard her get up the next morning at six. She had dressed and was drinking coffee at the kitchen table when I came in half an hour later.
“Blue Monday,” she said.
“Feeling down?”
“Actually, not one bit.” She gazed out the window. “Really love this view.”
I filled a cup and sat down.
She looked at her watch. “When you’re ready, I’ll take a ride back to my place. I want to get to school early, set up your parents for today’s group.”
“How many do you expect?”
“About twenty. Quite a few are Spanish-speaking. I can be your translator but it means I’ve got to clear my desk first.”
“Sounds good.”
“Do you think you’ll need more than one session?”
“Probably not. I’ll be available for individual follow-ups.”
“Great.”
Both of us talking shop, skirting the personal as if it were a dead animal in the middle of the road.
I drank a little more coffee.
She said, “Want any breakfast?”
“Nope. You?”
She shook her head. “How about a rain check, then? I’m a pretty good breakfast cook- nothing Cordon Bleu, just down-home integrity and high quantity.”
“I look forward to making you prove it.”
Her smile was sudden, white, dazzling.
We touched hands. I drove her home.
During the drive she looked out the window a lot and I sensed more pulling away- a reaffirmation of her ability to take care of herself. So I dropped her off in front of her building, told her I’d see her at eleven, put gas in the Seville, and used a pay phone at the station to call my service for the messages I’d neglected to pick up yesterday. Just one, from Mahlon Burden, reminding me to call his son and reiterating Howard Burden’s business number.
Just after nine I called Encino.
A female voice said, “Pierce, Sloan, and Marder.”
“Howard Burden, please.”
Her tone became guarded. “One moment.”
Another female voice, louder and nasaclass="underline" “Howard Burden’s office.”
“I’d like to speak with Mr. Burden.”
“Whom shall I say is calling?”
“Dr. Delaware.”
“May I ask what this is about, Doctor?”
“A personal matter. I was referred by Mr. Burden’s father.”
Hesitation. “One moment.”
She was gone for what seemed like a long time. Then: “I’m sorry. Mr. Burden’s in a meeting.”
“Any idea when he’ll be free?”
“No, I don’t.”
“I’ll give you my number. Please ask him to call me.”
“I’ll deliver the message.” Frosty tone. Letting me know a call-back was about as likely as world peace. I thought I understood her protectiveness.
“I’m not with the press,” I said. “His father is pretty eager for me to talk with him. You can call Mr. Burden Senior and confirm that.”
“I’ll give him the message, sir.”
Another roadblock at the entrance to Ocean Heights. When I saw the pair of squad cars, my hands went clammy.
But this was a smaller police presence than on the day of the sniping- just two black-and-whites, an equal number of uniformed cops standing in the middle of the street, chatting with each other, looking relaxed.
They refused to answer my questions and had a few of their own. I spent a long time explaining who I was, waiting for them to call the school and verify it with Linda. She couldn’t be reached. Finally, after showing them my psych license and med school faculty card and tossing in Milo’s name, I was allowed through.
Before I walked back to my car I tried again. “So what’s going on?”
The cops looked amused and annoyed at the same time.