Chapter 9-1
1356 Words
Chapter 9
“God. You should have seen her, Bill. I wish I could have shared it with you. We had the best time picking out the yarn.” Perrin’s voice over the phone was almost as breathless as Tammy’s had been.
“Wish I could have seen it.” He wished it so much it ached. His daughter had come home from her afternoon lit up like she was the queen of the world. Any lingering desire to chew her out for lying to him about going to Gretchen’s died when she threw herself into his arms.
“It took her a good half hour at top speed to tell me about all the things the two of you had done. And she can talk awfully fast when she’s on a roll.”
Bill lay back on the top of his bed covers and stared at the dim ceiling.
“You aren’t upset, are you?” Perrin’s voice was soft.
“Upset? At what?”
“Well, I mean I know I shouldn’t be attaching myself to her, or letting her attach to me, but she’s such an amazing kid. And she wants to grow up so badly. Do you remember what that was like?”
Bill remembered joining the high-school theater as a freshman and having his entire life changed when Mary Ann, an awe-inspiring junior, had wandered across the stage carrying some tools to go fix a broken Fresnel lamp. She’d been tall, slender, with dark hair down past the middle of her back. His worldview had altered in that moment. He’d never grown up fast enough to get her attention. Hell, he’d never once been able to tell her how he worshipped her in the two years they did shows together before she graduated and was gone.
“Yeah, I remember what it was like. I just wish it wasn’t my girl doing it. And no, I’m not upset. I just wish I could have been there with her… With you. How can I miss you so much? We hardly know each other.”
“You could ask me out on a date.”
He could, if he could just figure out how to arrange it. Turandot was finally down and the set struck and returned to storage. For a while, the weeknights and weekends were his once more. His and his kids.
“Where are you now?”
“Why? Are you asking me out now? I thought your kids were asleep.”
“They are. I just wanted to picture where you were, what you were doing. What I really wish is that you were lying on the pillow beside mine.” And he did. Against all likelihood, he could picture her here, in the bedroom where no woman had ever been. He wanted to turn and see Perrin beside him. All her chaos, all her uncertainty, all her beauty, and all that magnificence curled up beside him. He could see it so clearly, as if she were—
“I’m in my studio.”
“Oh,” a dose of reality. He was sprawled on the bed thinking more about s*x than any teenage boy, and she was working.
“I’m lying n***d on my cutting table, just waiting for a strong man to come and ravage me.”
The heat that flashed through his body left him sweating and his pulse racing.
“O-kay. That’s an image I going to be glad to be stuck with for a long time.”
Perrin giggled, just like a happy teenage girl who was thinking as much about s*x as he was.
“How about something simpler?”
“Spoilsport,” she made a raspberry sound. “Such a party pooper, you don’t even want to come here. Big meanie would rather leave me all alone and unravaged in my little bed.”
“Thought you were… ” he lowered his voice to make sure it didn’t carry down the hall to the kids, “… sprawled n***d on your design table waiting desperately for me?”
“Oh no, any strong and willing man would be fine. You just happen to be the one I’m talking to. And I’m not n***d, I’m wearing a flannel nightgown. Yes, all alone in my own bed.”
“Not how I pictured you.” Not at all. He’d thought Perrin would be one to sleep n***d, or in one of those oversized t-shirts that always made a woman’s legs look so amazing.
“No, Bill Cullen, I’ve never worn a little black teddy, nor am I planning to anytime soon. Not even for your fantasies. If you’re going to ravage me, you’ll just have to deal with a woman who wears plain white flannel nightgowns.”
“Not even pink?”
“Nope, white.”
“JC Penny’s?”
“Caught me.”
“Actually, that’s an image I could definitely work with. And no, Perrin Williams, I don’t want to ravage you… ” he let the silence drag for several seconds. “I’m desperate to ravage you.”
Her voice was soft and dreamy. “You’d better make it soon, Bill Cullen. I don’t know how much longer I can stand it if you don’t.”
“I’ve have to see you. What are you doing tomorrow?” It so hard to form normal, practical thoughts with her voice whispering into his ear.
“I thought you were going to be with the kids.”
“I am. I was thinking we could have a picnic.”
“With the kids?” she sounded suddenly cautious and practical. He knew he should be as well.
“They do appear to know you better than I do. Maybe it’s time I caught up a bit.”
“You’re sure?”
Was he? Even though he’d been the one to invite her, Perrin was still giving him an out. Pushing him to do what was right rather than what she knew was their mutual desperation to be with each other. Yet another layer of flighty designer was peeled off to reveal the practical woman inside.
“Some day, Perrin, you’re going to have to tell me why you carry your shields so high.”
Her echoing silence told him he’d screwed up. Cassidy Knowles had only reinforced Perrin’s statement that she wouldn’t be sharing her life history. He cursed himself for being eight kinds of dumb. To have been hurt so badly and rise above it, how much strength had that taken? How many conscious choices had she made to be a better person despite her past? He didn’t even need to know what her past had been to know what affect it had upon who she was. She had risen triumphant from whatever ashes…
“I don’t know if I can, Bill. I truly don’t know if I can.” Her voice was so small.
“I’m sorry, honey. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
Again the interminable silence. Honey? He was becoming awfully attached to her. Well, it was no less than the truth, he was.
“Would you still like me on your picnic?” Her voice was even smaller if possible.
“Yes. No equivocation. No doubt. I’m not the fastest guy around, but I eventually get there. I would very much like you to join us.”
Another silence.
Then, after the silence had dragged on long enough that he wondered if she was still there, he heard a quiet, “Thank you.”
* * * *
“It’s raining!”
“I noticed!” Perrin dove into the back of Bill’s car and wound up sitting next to Jaspar.
Bill made a signal to Tamara to move back. He should have thought of it sooner, but it had been her turn to be up front.
Perrin stopped her before she even had her seatbelt undone. “Don’t! You’ll just get wet and I’ll get wetter if we try to trade.”
“Some day for a picnic, Dad,” Jaspar accused him as if he had personal control of the weather.
“It was sunny this morning,” he glanced over his shoulder at her and mouthed a, “Hi!” which Perrin returned. It was so damn good to see her he could hardly stand it.
“I guess we could go to a restaurant,” Bill leaned forward to look up at the sky through the windshield and cursed the changeable spring weather.
Jaspar declared his opinion with a loud snoring sound.
“Gotta do better than that, Dad,” Tammy joined in on her brother’s side. “Perrin did pizza and cool costumes last time. You’re gonna have to top that.”
“Ouch! Don’t I get a break, extra points for being your father who can make you wash dishes every night for a month if he feels like it?”
“Nope!” the kids both roared back at him.
Perrin shot him a grin in the rearview mirror.
“What?”
“How about the backup plan we discussed last night?”
She was definitely smiling, something up her sleeve. They hadn’t discussed any backup plan. Oh, she was trying to help him save face in front of the kids, bless her.
“Which one?” he asked, trying to keep up with the game.
“How about the one at CenturyLink Center, on Occidental.”
“Oh right. Sure.”
She winked at him as he pulled back into traffic and Jaspar started telling her all about his stage role even if the backstage stuff was the part that he found to be really “wicked.”
A glance at Tammy told him that, as usual, her dad hadn’t deceived her for even a moment.
- Writer
