Suddenly a Bride (8 page)

Danny winced at the nickname, and so did Elizabeth.

Her cell phone began to vibrate in the pocket of her shorts. She put down the folding chair and pulled out her phone, looked at the displayed number, and then lifted the phone to her ear. “Hello, Richard,” she said, turning her back on the crowd of children and coaches—and Will—and walking a few feet away. “How was the interview? I taped it, but I had to get the boys to baseball practice, so I didn’t see it yet. I didn’t want to feel rushed when I—Oh, that’s wonderful!”

She listened, making what she hoped were intelligent comments at appropriate times, as Richard told her all about his interview and about the room-service breakfast that didn’t arrive, so that he had made a pig of himself in the green room and ended up going onto the set with powdered sugar on his tie.

“Speaking of pigs,” she said when Richard was done with his news, “the boys and I went to an IronPigs game last night.” She nodded as she turned around, pushing her hair out of her eyes as the breeze kicked up, watching Will lift two heavy canvas gear bags up and onto his shoulders as if they were stuffed with marshmallows. “No, it was fun,” she assured Richard, who seemed surprised at her news. “Richard? Do you think the boys need haircuts?”

She frowned at his answer. And then she tried to tell herself he wasn’t so uninvolved with the twins that he hadn’t really noticed their hair.

“That’s very polite of you, Richard, but surely you have an opinion. No…no reason you
should.
I just thought you would, that’s all. Well, tell me this, then. Do you think Mario would cut the boys’ hair?” She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. “
How
much? For both of them or just one of them?
Each?
You’re kidding! That’s…that’s just out of the question.
No,
I won’t have Mario put it on your tab. Don’t be ridiculous. I’ll see what I can do. When’s your next interview?”

After warning her that he’d be flying to Chicago at seven that night and probably would be out of touch for the evening, Richard hung up—but only after reminding her to stay out of his office and consider herself on vacation until he returned.

She closed the phone, feeling suddenly lost, cut off and extremely uncomfortable at how easy it was that Richard hadn’t planned to call her again tonight.

And then, shockingly, following hard on the heels of her momentary unease, Elizabeth realized she also felt good. Very, very good.

Unencumbered. Or at least as unencumbered as the mother of two can ever feel.

And young. She felt young. There had been days, weeks—years—when she’d felt as old as time and just as weary and burdened.

But today? Ah, today the sun was shining. She’d made two new friends. She was on vacation for at least the next week, with nothing to do but be with her boys, to please herself, to remember that she wasn’t even thirty yet, let alone as old as time.

And a man had noticed her. Oh, certainly Richard had noticed her…noticed her as much as Richard noticed anything, bless his heart. But when Will looked at her she
felt
noticed. And young. And…yes…desirable.

He made her tingle. She would admit that to herself because there was no sense in pretending she hadn’t felt it. That awareness, that sure and certain knowledge that he was man and she was woman. Whether they knew each other well or not,
chemistry
was happening.

Elizabeth put her hands to her suddenly burning cheeks, and that’s when she realized she was smiling.
Oh, what a naughty girl you are,
she thought.
How long has it been since you’ve been naughty?

“Elizabeth?”

She broke out of her thoughts when she heard Will call her name and saw that he had picked up her lawn
chair, the twins standing on either side of him, holding all of their own gear.

“Oh, we’re ready to leave? Here, you have those bags. I can carry my own chair.”

“That’s all right. We’ll all heading in the same direction. Dan’s okay, by the way. Aren’t you, Dan The Man?”

“It was only a ball,” Danny grumbled. “But you’re still buying me a water ice, right?”

“Danny!”

Will grinned at her. “Bribery,” he explained. “When tears threaten, bribery is always an option. Do you mind?”

She looked at her watch. “I suppose a water ice wouldn’t ruin their lunch. But don’t you have to get to court or something?”

“No. Along with playing baseball coach, I’ve been barred from stepping foot in the courthouse for two weeks now that I wrapped up my last case on the docket. I only had a couple of pretrial things going on anyway, and they’ve been pushed back until next month, courtesy of The Hammer. Since I’m my own boss, I’ve juggled some appointments and decided that every hardworking lawyer needs a vacation now and then.”

“That’s nice. Richard always says that there are benefits and problems in being self-employed. The benefit is that you’re your own boss and can work when you want to, but the downside is that you’re your own boss and it doesn’t pay to coddle your employee.”

“I’d say Richard has a point. I’ve been known to beat myself up rather badly when I’m facing a trial deadline. I’ve often thought of reporting myself to authorities for not paying myself some pretty hefty overtime.”

They’d reached the parking lot, and Elizabeth hunted in her purse for her car keys, clicking on the button that opened the back hatch of her SUV. Will had done much the same thing with his Mercedes while the twins piled into her backseat and strapped themselves into their booster seats.

“Today I’ll just follow you,” she told him. “I want to take the boys to the mall after you pay off on your bribe, to see if I can find one of those walk-in hairdressers for them.”

Will cocked one well-defined eyebrow at her. “Heard that, did you?”

She shook her head. “Heard what? Oh, you mean how one of the coaches called Danny, Curly?”

“Okay,” he said, nodding. “We’ll go with that one.”

“What? What did I miss?”

“Nothing. When the team was in line to get their handouts one of the boys called Mike, Mary. Mike didn’t notice, so I let it go. But I was going to try to figure out a way to tell you it might be time for the twins to lose the curls.”

“You were going to do that?”

He held up his hands as if in self-defense. “I know, I know. Butting in where I don’t belong. It’s just…it’s just that you don’t have anybody to help steer you through the waters on this stuff, as it were. I noticed, that’s all.”

Richard didn’t.
The thought came to Elizabeth’s mind, and she guiltily shooed it away, telling herself that Richard was Richard, and it was all right that he didn’t notice things. Like the new dress she’d bought last week. Or the fact that she’d cut her hair.

“Elizabeth? Honest to God, I’m not trying to tell you how to raise your sons. God knows it’s none of my business. And you’d already decided to get them haircuts, right?”

“Annie—Todd’s mother—thought they were girls,” Elizabeth told him. “So, yes, I’d already decided. And their hair isn’t
that
long, is it?”

“No,” Will said quickly. “It’s the curls, and the being blond, I suppose. And they’re how old now, seven?”

They’re my babies. They’re all I have.
“Yes, all of seven. But I refuse to shave their heads. I don’t care what other parents do. I’ve always trimmed their hair myself. Do you know of a good salon?”

“You don’t want a salon, Elizabeth. You want a barber. And, yes, I do. I think Sid gave me my first real haircut a million years ago. Well, over thirty years ago. And you know what, I have an idea.”

“Oh, you do, do you?” Elizabeth felt that go-with-the-flow thing sneaking up on her again. “And am I going to like this idea?”

“Maybe not, but I think the boys will. See, I remember my first haircut. I remember the tickle of the electric trimmer on the back of my neck. I remember the oil Sid slicked over my hair. I remember the lollipop he gave me. And I remember my mother sitting on a chair over
in the corner, crying because I didn’t look like her baby anymore.”

Elizabeth bit her bottom lip for a moment. “You’re thinking I might cry and make a fool of myself as those beautiful blond curls hit the barbershop floor.”

“Might? No, that’s probably pretty much a given. I’m thinking Mike and Dan will be embarrassed that their mother is crying. I know I was. So how’s this for a plan? I pay off my bribe to Dan, then I drop you at the mall and we plan to meet somewhere in about two hours—after Sid has done his thing.”

“Oh, I don’t—”

“It’s a guy thing, Elizabeth. A man thing.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, actually believing she could see Mikey and Danny smiling and waving as they flew away from her, flapping the little wings on their backs, going off into the big bad world without her.

“A man thing. I understand.” She looked up at Will’s open, smiling face. “And you’re laughing at me, aren’t you?”

“Only a little. It’s just hair, Elizabeth. They aren’t running off to join the circus or anything.”

“And Sid? Is he good?”

“I still have both my ears, don’t I?”

“Oh, I give up,” Elizabeth said at last, handing him the keys to her SUV. “I’m just going to go with the flow.”

“Sometimes that’s the only way to travel,” Will said, opening the driver’s side door, leaving her to walk
around the front of the SUV and help herself into the passenger seat. Which wasn’t very romantic of him.

Then she wondered why that bothered her.

They met at the food court three hours later. A very long three hours later, although Elizabeth felt they had been hours well spent. Will had called her cell phone from the parking lot, and she had immediately ordered vegetable pizzas, two lemonades and two iced teas. Her haul was already on the table in front of her, waiting for the others to arrive; her small mound of packages sat at her nervously tapping feet as she tried to sit quietly, pretending she wasn’t a nervous wreck.

She’d bought a new dress, a sleeveless cotton sheath that was on sale—half off—which didn’t make it any more lovely than it already was. The lower price just seemed to make its hot pink color more reasonable, considering she felt the need to buy accessories to go with it: a small shoulder purse of baby-soft ivory leather, a drop necklace of pink and lime-green stones that matched her new lime-green strappy heels. She’d even visited the cosmetics counter to splurge on new lipstick and blusher to complete the outfit, which really hadn’t been complete until she’d also purchased a new plunge bra and some bikini underwear that promised not to show panty lines.

She liked thinking about the new dress, the jewelry, shoes and cosmetics. She’d consider the bra an impulse buy and tried not to think about it at all.

Then she bought each of the boys new talking race
cars they’d asked for when the race cars she’d bought them for Christmas became obsolete thanks to the just released talking versions. Toys, she’d long ago decided, were like cereal and laundry products. The manufacturers were always bringing out new and improved versions to get you to buy them again.

With her stomach rumbling as the aroma of the pizza escaped the closed box, she stood up beside the table she’d chosen, scanning the shoppers for her first sight of her newly shorn sons. When she saw them coming toward her, she sat down again all at once, her knees having lost the ability to keep her upright.

Was it their haircuts? Was it the now darkly blond slicked-down hair so neatly parted on the left, just the way Jamie had worn his before the chemo took it all away, so that they showed their resemblance to their father in a way she had never noticed before this moment? Was it how handsome they both looked, how happy they both looked…how grown up they both looked?

Or was it the easy way they walked hand in hand with Will, chattering up at him, not even bothering to look for her, so happy to be with him. What had Will said? Oh, yes. How could she forget: “It’s a man thing.”

And it was true, it probably was. And one the twins had no experience with, or at least no memory of, poor things. A male figure in their lives. A father figure in their lives.

“Oh, God…”

Elizabeth got to her feet again as she tried to collect
herself and then called out as brightly as she could, “Hello! Will? Who are those two strangers you’ve got with you? I bought Danny and Mikey the new cars they wanted—but I don’t see them anywhere.”

“Mo-om,” Danny complained, rolling his eyes. “It’s us. Stop kidding.”

“It is? Oh, my goodness, it is! Well, don’t you two look handsome!”

“The curls are still there,” Will told her as the boys scrambled into seats, and Mikey all but ripped off the top of the pizza box. She loved vegetable pizza—the boys never even realized they were getting all that broccoli into their tummies. “Sid just put some kind of taming gel on them for now. I bought the boys some and left it in the car. So, what do you think? You’re not going to burst into tears or anything, right? I promised Dan and Mike you wouldn’t.”

Dan and Mike? He kept calling them Dan and Mike. What happened to Danny and Mikey? Elizabeth felt a sense of panic rising in her.
Please, somebody, stop the world. I want to get off!
Something inside her screamed. “No, I’m not going to cry,” she said, not looking at either twin, or at Will, either, for that matter. “I saved some of their curls from the first time I cut their hair. If I get too maudlin, I’ll just pull out those bags and hide in my room as I sob like a
girl.
”

She dared to take another look at her sons. “They…they really look like their father now.”

“Do they? I imagine you’d know. But even though they’re supposed to be identical, I think Dan looks a lot
like you when he smiles. And there’s something about the way Mike uses his eyes that reminds me of you.”

Elizabeth reached for a slice of pizza even as she looked toward Will, just to give herself something to do, because her appetite had completely deserted her. “How he uses his eyes?”

“Yes, exactly like that.”

“Like what?”

“The way you just looked at me. Your head tipped forward just a little, so that you’re looking at me sort of through your lashes. It’s very effective. Sugared or unsugared?”