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  I spent the remainder of the afternoon relaxing by my pool and came in reluctantly only when it was time to get ready for dinner. I took a really cold shower, not because I had been picturing Jack naked again, but because it was a hundred and eight degrees inside my house. I did the best I could with makeup that melted the minute it touched my skin and combed my hair out straight. There was no way I was going to use the hair dryer when I was already dripping sweat, so I pulled the sides of my hair into a clip at the back of my head. It looked a little too cute for my personality, but I didn’t care. I put on the lightest-weight sundress I could find and little strappy sandals and dug my decent purse out of the box marked MISC BEDROOM. I dumped my wallet, keys and lipstick in the purse, then went outside to sit in my air conditioned orange Honda Element until Jack arrived.

  He pulled up about ten minutes later. “Going somewhere?” he mouthed through the closed window.

  I killed the engine and walked around to the passenger side of the monster truck and hoisted myself in, somehow managing not to flash him my underwear in the process. He was smiling again.

  “Jeez, this is a real graceful vehicle.”

  “Some people seem to have a little less trouble. Were you going somewhere?”

  “Nah, it was cooler in the car than in the house, so I just waited out there.”

  “I don’t think I knew you were so strange back in high school. I thought you just liked to picture me naked.” He backed out of the driveway and turned down Shasta towards Bear Creek. I feigned indignation.

  “Hunh. What makes you think that?”

  “Baby, all the girls liked to imagine me naked.” I dropped my head back onto my shoulders and rolled my eyes towards the ceiling. This was going to be a long night if he was serious. He turned right onto Bear Creek and then got into the turn lane to make the left onto Grant Street.

  He looked at me sideways and grinned. “Not buying it, huh? Yeah, me neither. It was always the other way around. I mean, I thought I had a shot there for a minute after you broke up with that runner, what was his name?”

  Ugh. My boyfriend for most of my junior year. “Derek?”

  “Yeah, Derek. Harrison, I think it was. Anyway, after you broke up with him, I thought maybe I’d have a chance, but then you sort of vanished our senior year.”

  This was all news to me. I had never for a second thought that Jack Murphy wanted to go out with me, largely because he had never asked, never passed me a note, never asked Pauline if I liked him. Nothing. Not to mention, he dated Pauline our senior year.

  “First of all, I didn’t vanish. You just started dating Pauline, and next to her, I become invisible. And second of all, you never asked me.”

  “What if I had?” Ah, a trick question.

  “I’m here now, aren’t I?”

  We went to the The Corral, a steak house on Orchard Avenue near the Southern Pacific train depot. It’s dark and used to be smoky, back when smoking was allowed in restaurants in California. The decor consists of walls lined with pine boards branded with “The Corral,” and red and white checked tablecloths. They aren’t going to win any interior design awards, but the steaks are great. I ordered a beer. I don’t much like beer, but Minter is a beer kind of town, the The Corral is a beer kind of place and Jack looked to be a beer kind of guy. I felt outnumbered, so I had a beer.

  The waiter brought sourdough bread with the beers and I dug into it like I hadn’t eaten for a month. I love bread and I’d been eating nothing but fast food hamburgers from drive-up windows for days now, in my quest to keep a low profile. Jack watched, the amused smile back in place. Finally, the breadbasket empty and the table littered with little gold foil butter wrappers, Jack brought out the magic clipboard.

  “Here’s the thing. Your house has good bones.” I must have looked worried because he continued, “That means it’s structurally sound.” Relief. I’d been picturing corpses. “Your biggest problems right now are the air conditioner, which probably needs a new compressor, flooring in the master bedroom, some plumbing problems in both bathrooms and a couple leaks in the roof. Plus the squeaky floorboard in the hall.” That sounded bad to me. “It’s not bad.” Okey-dokey then. “And it’s too small of a job for me to schedule in.” I sighed. “No, that’s a good thing. Well, good for you, anyway.”

  Jack went on to explain that construction is often a waiting business, waiting for deliveries and waiting for subcontractors and waiting for weather and just waiting. Big jobs have lots of waiting, which meant that if I could be flexible, he could work on my house while he was waiting on other projects. And since that would normally be dead time to him anyway, he would charge me just ten percent over the cost of materials. Sold.

  The steaks came and the clipboard went away. I cut into my rare filet mignon and felt the saliva pool in my mouth. Unlike southern California, Minter has no sushi bars, tapas bars or fine dining. There was a French restaurant once, but it didn’t last long. Apparently when the local economy depended on eradicating pests like snails, people weren’t inclined to view them as a delicacy. The fanciest restaurant had a dress code requiring clean jeans and shirts with sleeves. But what Minter lacked in variety and class, it made up for in quality. Cattle and hogs were raised locally, and if you went with the odds and ordered a steak or pork chops, you’d never be disappointed.

  Over the steaks and beer, Jack and I reminisced about high school and caught each other up on our lives, and I disabused him of many of the stories he had heard about me throughout the day. I now had children and a criminal record, plus a terminal illness, among my many other troubles. And apparently the mystery man in the orchard was Jack himself.

  “Why would we do it in an orchard?” I asked when he told me he was my hypothetical boyfriend. Junior high school kids made out in orchards. Teenagers with cars and adults with beds and sense did not.

  “Well, they’re saying you’re a little crazy.”

  “I hope you denied any involvement with such a freaking loon. Can’t be good for business.”

  “Nah, I could use the excitement. Haven’t had a good scandal since Bobby bought that Toyota pickup.” Bobby was Jack’s older brother and one of the partners in their family construction business. Over the years, it had become acceptable for local women to drive foreign automobiles, and Japanese minivans and SUVs now clogged the mall parking lot. But for men, at least those in studly occupations such as farming and construction, American-made pickups were required.

  I passed on dessert, a first for me, but after all the bread I thought maybe I should cool it on the carbs, and I stifled a yawn. It wasn’t one of those get me out of here yawns, I was just genuinely worn out. Jack motioned for the bill, then refused to let me split it with him. Which was good because I couldn’t afford to be eating steak. I could barely afford to be eating.

  “No way, Alex, I invited you.” He added a tip to the charge slip and signed his name in nice, legible writing. We headed to the parking lot. I gasped when we stepped from the comfort of the restaurant to the blast furnace that is Minter at eleven o’clock at night in July.

  “So your first project will be my AC, right?” I asked, trying not to be pushy.

  “Yep. Which reminds me. It would be helpful if I had a key to your place so I could come in and work when you’re not around. I mean, it’ll all get done quicker that way, but if it’s something you’re not comfortable with, I understand.” He beeped the behemoth truck open and heaved me up into the passenger seat.

  “Not a problem.” I fished around in my purse and pulled out a ring the realtor had given me with half a dozen spare keys. I couldn’t imagine who would need so many spare keys. I slid one off the ring and gave it to Jack.

  We drove back to my place in silence. It wasn’t awkward or anything, and I was starting to wake up a little, and maybe my thoughts were a little less than pure. He parked in the driveway next to my weird-looking square SUV and came around to help me out of the stupid truck and then walked me to the door. The mo
tion sensor light came on. I got my own key from my purse and put it in the lock.

  “Do you want to come in?” I had a horrible thought and smacked myself on the forehead with the palm of my hand, narrowly missing my left eye with the house key. “Oh shit, you’re not gay, are you?” Look, my husband left me for another man. I’m obviously not the best judge of these things.

  He smiled and shook his head no. “Not gay, but I have to get up at four tomorrow to start a new job, and after this morning I’m not sure I’m ready to see you at that hour.” He bent down and kissed me, just kind of brushing his lips to mine, said goodnight, and trudged back to the truck. I went inside and locked the door behind me.

  The frightening first impression could probably be overcome in time. The important thing was that he liked girls. It’d be much more problematic to overcome not having a penis, if that’s what he was looking for. I figured eventually I’d raise my standards to include more than heterosexuality, but for now, the fact that a guy liked breasts was at least as important to me as whether he had a job or scratched himself in public.

  I woke up Saturday with a plan. Since the master bedroom was still a construction zone, I was sleeping in the middle bedroom, but I had been using the master bath anyway. First on the agenda was a nice, long shower, and I took full advantage of all of the shower massage’s many uses. I dried off and wrapped my hair up in the towel turban-style while I did my makeup, including blush and everything. I didn’t want my mother thinking I was so unattractive I had driven Max to the other team. I blow-dried my hair so it was shiny and smooth and sleek, a look that was popular back in southern California but that was probably still ten years away from Minter. Minter was stuck in the permed, big-hair heyday of the eighties.

  Next on the agenda was food. I had nothing in the cupboards and less in the fridge. I went out to the driveway because I didn’t have enough room in the garage for the Element and hopped in. I dialed Pauline on the cell phone as I drove.

  “Hello?” She sounded sleepy. I checked the clock on the dash. Seven-fifteen. Oops. Hopefully she was alone.

  “Where do I shop for food in this town?”

  “Hello. Shop-N-Save on Olive. It’s Saturday, right?”

  “Uh, yeah.”

  “Okay, good, so your sister-in-law won’t be at work.”

  “She works there?”

  “Yeah, she’s the grocery manager.” I paused and Pauline continued, “Your brother works at an insurance company. I can’t think of the name, but he’s a partner so it must have Jordan in the name somewhere. And he’s running for office.” Duh! I’d seen little signs in a few manicured front yards that said “Jordan for Supervisor,” but I’d had no idea it was that Jordan. Probably my mother had mentioned it, but sentences beginning with Brian usually faded to white noise in my brain before the thought could be completed.

  “Okay, thanks Paul. I have to go to the folks’ for a barbecue this afternoon. Wanna come over?” I felt like I was twelve.

  “Nope, I have a date tonight and no offense, but I don’t consider an afternoon with your family foreplay.” I couldn’t argue with her there, so I hung up and headed in the direction of Shop-N-Save.

  An hour later, I had a fully stocked kitchen, right down to the condiments. I had gotten coffee at Starbucks on the way back and now I poured myself a bowl of cereal and cut up a banana on it and then drowned the whole mess in two-percent milk. I ate it at the counter, sitting on a barstool, and then took my decaf mocha latte and squeaked my way down the hall into the office to make some money.

  The great thing about graphic design in this day and age is that you can work for anyone, anywhere. I can transfer files electronically, and with existing clients, I never even have to show up for a presentation. I can just email them my sketches and ideas. My goal was to acquire local clients as soon as I could, but I had enough work from southern California to pay the bills, at least for now. I picked up a file folder and rifled through it. First Baptist Church/Temple Beth Shalom in Westminster had hired me a couple years ago to design their respective logos and letterheads, and I continued to work for them on a monthly basis doing layouts for their bulletins and newsletters. It was basically boilerplate stuff, but I tried to be creative and innovative in my use of color and design elements. The Jewish High Holy Days were approaching, so I thought I better get to work on their materials. I booted up the computer and waited for Adobe Illustrator to appear onscreen, sipping my latte and gazing out the window. I could already see little waves of heat rising from the street.

  I was startled by a loud knock at my front door, and I realized I had been on quite a roll and had lost track of time. I glanced at the little clock at the bottom of the computer screen. Wow, one-thirty. I looked out the office window and saw a red Minter City Fire Department pickup parked out front. Probably here about the weed abatement notice. The front yard was crunchy yellow grass, but at least I’d cut it to normal lawn-length now, and I’d set the automatic sprinklers so they were watering daily and little blades of green were starting to peek through here and there. I walked towards the door, yelling as I went.

  “I’m coming! I cut down all the weeds in the back yard, too, and I’ve been watering so it’s not so dry.” I fumbled with the deadbolt. “Hold on, you can come see for yourself.”

  I wrenched the door open and stopped short, staring dumbfounded at the man on my front porch. I was pretty sure my heart stopped beating, and I had to lean against the doorjamb to keep my balance.

  Danny Salazar stood looking at me with the hint of a smile on his lips. He looked a lot like he had the last time I had seen him, twelve years ago, only kind of more so. His jaw was a little squarer, his muscular six foot frame seemed even more powerful and at the same time a little leaner and maybe harder, his curly black hair a little shorter. He was half Colombian and half Irish, and had the bronze coloring of someone with a perpetual, even suntan. The fire department captain’s uniform threw me somewhat because I was used to seeing him in jeans or a baseball uniform. But he could have been wearing a tutu, and I still would have recognized his eyes. They were brown flecked with gold, adding to the overall catlike appearance, and though they were more lined now I would know them anywhere. Danny had the kind of expressive eyes that, if you knew what to look for, would tell you exactly what he was feeling. I’d seen them dark and hard as ball bearings, and I shuddered even now at the memory. But I’d also seen them warm and soft and playful. Today the smile on the lips didn’t reach the eyes. Today the eyes were wary.

  “Hello, Lex.” Honestly, the sound of his voice was almost enough to give me an orgasm right there on the front porch. It was deep and kind of rough and damn sexy. Danny was the only person who ever called me Lex. He had once called me Alexis, never Alex.

  I nodded. I seemed to have lost the capacity for speech, something my mother would never believe.

  “Are you going to say something?”

  “Shit.” I had imagined this encounter possibly a million times over the past twelve years, and in all those times, not once did I start out with “shit.” I was beginning to have a really bad feeling about this.

  Danny waved some papers at me. “Can I come in?”

  Duh. I motioned him in and led him to the living room, where I gestured vaguely at some furniture, indicating he could sit. He took the couch, and I sat in the chair across from him and smacked my hand to my forehead to jar my brain into working, sort of like when you slap a hysterical person to get them to focus. It worked, kind of.

  “So I guess you’re here about the weeds.”

  “Well, I do need to sign off on the paperwork, but mainly I came to check out the rumors.” He was still half smiling and watching me closely.

  “I am getting divorced, I did buy this house, I don’t have kids or a criminal record, I’m not insane and I’m not dying. I think that’s about it.”

  He raised his eyebrow into a little question mark and asked, “Jack Murphy?”

  I sighed and shook
my head. “He’s just doing some work around the house.”

  “Uh-hunh.”

  None of this was going the way I’d imagined it. And I’d imagined it lots of ways. Sometimes, I was righteously indignant and yelled and threw things and made my point. Sometimes, he picked me up and carried me off to ravish me like in some romance novel. Sometimes, I slugged him in the stomach and told him to go fuck himself. That’s the trouble with reality, I guess, it never really goes the way you plan. But at least my faculties were returning and now, in addition to shock and animal lust, I was beginning to feel other things. Like pain and anger and a primitive need to hurt back. I knew it was juvenile, but there it was.

  “I didn’t know you were back in Minter.” Let’s get that straight -- I didn’t move here because of you, buddy.

  “Yeah, about three years now. Too many knee surgeries to keep playing.” He’d been a catcher, went to college on a baseball scholarship and then played a few years in the majors, for the A’s. I had seen a couple of his professional games on television, but it wasn’t easy for me to watch him.

  “And the fireman outfit?”

  “We like to call it a uniform. I got my master’s degree in fire science while I was playing ball.” He grinned like a little kid. “You know how boys always want to be firemen when they grow up.” He seemed happy, or at least content, and I felt my eyes stray involuntarily to his hands. No wedding ring. He caught me looking and shook his head. “I was engaged once, right after college. Didn’t work out.”

  I nodded, and an awkward silence began to unfold. I glanced at my watch. I didn’t actually care if I was late to my parents’, but I had too many emotions to figure out, and I couldn’t do it with him sitting there staring at me and looking more amazing than ever.

  “I have to go, my parents are expecting me for a barbecue.” Neither of us made a move to stand. Our eyes locked and held.

  Danny spoke, his voice quiet. “You’re still angry.” It wasn’t a question.