Weddings in the Family

He grinned, his mouth hovering over the nipple he had just kissed through her shirt. “Do you want me to stop?”

“No, I—” Her hand caressed the hair at the nape of his neck and gently, slowly, she eased his head and mouth back to her breast. “I’ll tell you the rest later,” she murmured.

CAROLINE LOUNGED AGAINST his shoulder, nestled between his body and the back of the couch. Their clothes were scattered on the floor, her panties resting precariously on the edge of the lamp shade. She shivered and he tucked her closer.

Her hand twirled the hair on his chest, her fingernails lightly dancing over his skin. “Did you eat something?”

“Yeah.” His fingers tangled in the curls above her ear and he leaned in for a long kiss. “A sandwich,” he managed to say when he could breathe again.

She was wedged between the cushion and his arm. With every breath she took, her body rubbed against his skin. He clamped his teeth against the surge of desire that raced through him. No matter how many times he was with her, she could start the reaction all over again with a simple smile, a touch of her hand, her skin against his.

Instead of giving in to the desire, he knew he had to tell her his news. The temptation to wait until the next day was balanced by the thought that their current bout of lovemaking had left her in a mellow mood.

“I had my formal review,” he began.

She jerked upright and he had to press his foot to the floor to keep from sliding off the couch. “You got your promotion, right?”

He nodded and she yipped, her face lighting up as she threw herself on top of him. “Oh, Nick! That’s wonderful. Now we can look for a house, finish paying off your school loans. You’ll have your own office, right? With a window? We can decorate it, add some personal touches. That cubicle you have now—”

“Wait.” He interrupted her with a hand on her lips and at her waist to keep her still. Her bouncing was causing parts of him to respond and he had to keep his wits about him.

She frowned. “You didn’t get a raise?” she mumbled against his fingers. “No new office?”

“No, I’ll get a raise.” He glanced at the ceiling, at the flickering lights of the television, toward the glass door leading to their small patio. Anywhere but at her shining face.

“Nick.” Her hands framed his cheeks and turned his attention back to her. “What is it?”

He’d never been a coward. She’d understand. She loved him. She wanted what was best for both of them and this was a grand opportunity for his career. She was a wonderful teacher, she’d find another job…

“The new office is in Missouri.”

Her stunned silence bounced off the walls. From the corner of his eye, he could see the comedian speaking to his cohort in the sitcom that had replaced the variety show, their mouths moving wordlessly. A branch scraped across the glass door of the patio.

“Caro?”

She pushed against his shoulders, climbing to her feet. She scooped up her clothes and hugged them against her body, crossing the space to the stairs.

“Don’t walk away. We have to talk about this.”

She glanced at him over her shoulder, dignified in her posture. For a moment, he was distracted by the lean length of her, the tight buttocks, the slender legs.

But her words snapped him back to the conversation. “You’re asking me to move, right? Did you hear a word I said earlier? No, of course you didn’t. I didn’t finish because you distracted me.”

She leaned forward. “Well, let me tell you the rest. Ms. Russell wants to develop my program for the entire district. The vice superintendent of curriculum, Nick!”

She flung her hands out, her stance a belligerent, naked goddess. “She wants me to work with the other teachers next year and go into their classrooms. The administration talked about it at their work session today and are willing to give me a stipend for the extra hours. Are you asking me to give that up?”

“No.” He stopped. How could she develop her program here in Iowa if they moved to Missouri for his new position?

Her eyes narrowed. “I’m not going.” She took another step toward the stairs and rested a hand on the railing. “This is what my mom did, Nick. She followed my dad everywhere he wanted to go. Not once did she get a chance to be her own person, someone other than George Armstrong’s wife.”

“Caro.” He sat up, his arms crossed over his thighs. She had looked fierce and commanding standing in the middle of the living room, her eyes intense. He felt vulnerable, arguing his case naked. “Good teachers are needed everywhere. You’ll get a great recommendation. You can start your reading program in Missouri.”

“You don’t start changing things as soon as you move into a new district.” She stomped toward the stairs, her body disappearing around the bend.

“We’re not done talking about this,” he called after her.

All he heard in response was the sound of her feet treading up the steps.

THE BEDROOM DOOR WAS shut when he made it upstairs. He had locked the doors, checked the windows, turned off all the lights. Stalling, to let her have time to get ready for bed, to calm down and realize that the promotion was good for both of them.

The lights were out in the room when he pushed the door open. “Caro?” he whispered.

The streetlight shone through a crack in the curtain and illuminated the bed, showing her curled on the farthest edge away from the door. He could hear her light breathing, but he couldn’t tell if she was asleep or faking it so she didn’t have to talk to him.

He crossed the room and entered the small bathroom, brushing his teeth quickly. He clicked off the light and made his way through the dark room, climbing onto his side of the bed.

She tensed up and he sighed. “Caro, we have to talk about this.”

Silence.

He touched her shoulder. “Caro.”

She rolled away and he waited for her to tumble from the bed. She paused and he knew she was clinging to the edge of the mattress.

“Fine.” He stretched out on his side of the bed, his back to her. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”

Breakfast was a quiet affair. He had awakened in the night, expecting her to be spooned around his back. Instead, he had felt only the wide chasm of the empty mattress between them. Hurt and angry, he had settled back into his pillow, determined to wait her out.

“I have a meeting tonight, so I’ll be home about six.” Her voice was neutral.

“Do you want me to start something for supper? I should be home at five-thirty.”

“There’s hamburger for tacos in the refrigerator.”

He nodded. Anyone observing them would see two people going about their before-work activities. No raised voices, no angry glares.

No kiss goodbye.

HE WAS CHOPPING TOMATOES into fine pieces when she came home. “Hi.” He kept his voice low. “How was your day?”

“Fine. We had a meeting with one of my parents. I think we sorted out the problem.”

“That’s good.” He slid the chopped tomatoes into one side of the divided bowl. His back to her, he unscrewed the lid on a jar of black olives and drained them before adding them to the other side of the bowl.

Caroline reached over his shoulder and snagged an olive, popping it into her mouth. Her other hand rested on his shoulder.

“Sorry about last night,” she said softly, her breath a whisper against his ear.

He relaxed and turned around, placing his hands on her waist. “It’s okay. I didn’t mean to spring it on you like that.”

She tilted back, her eyes narrowed. “You weren’t hoping that making love would keep me from yelling at you?”

“I didn’t plan it that way, but afterward, I did think it might help.” He kissed the tip of her nose and then edged away, giving the hamburger sizzling on the stove a stir. “I didn’t accept the promotion yet, Caro. I wanted to talk to you first.”

“I figured that out after I calmed down this morning.” She carried the condiments to the table and spread out the dishes he had stacked in the center. “I made a list.”

His bark of laughter echoed around the room. She faced him, her hands on her hips. “I know you think my lists are crazy, but they let us see all the options. I’ll show you after supper.”

He nodded and dished up the meat. Caroline was always easier to talk to when she was well fed.

After dinner, with the dishwasher humming quietly in the background, Caroline lit a candle on the kitchen counter. The soft scent of apple cinnamon cut through the spicy aroma of the tacos they had just eaten. Outside, a neighbor mowed the common area in front of the town houses, taking advantage of the light now that daylight saving time had started. Two children raced past the window on big-wheeled tricycles, their voices high and shrill over the loud whirring of their tires.

“I listed the pros and cons of two options,” Caroline said.

He turned away from the scene outside. “Two options?”

She pulled a tablet out of her bag and opened it to the first page. “Not what you think.”

He frowned. The only two options that came to his mind were taking the job or not taking the job.

She laid her hand on top of his. “You need to take the job, Nick. That’s a given. You’ve worked hard for the promotion. I know we didn’t consider a move, but that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. We just have to look at what’s good for both of us.”

He glanced at the paper she had turned toward him. The heading at the top caught his eye. “You stay in Iowa?”

“Yes. Wait—” she said quickly, lifting her hand. “Just listen before you say anything.”

She pointed to the first two items on her list. “Pros. You get the experience and job you deserve. I can develop my program with the teachers.”

He tapped the right side of the paper. “We won’t be together.”

“During the week.” She ran a finger over the words she had written on the first line of the con entry. “Four days.”

“Four days? We both work Monday through Friday.” How could she calmly suggest that they be apart four days each week? They hadn’t slept away from each other since their wedding night. Even angry last night, they’d been in the same bed.

“You’ll come home every Friday night. And I checked the mileage. If you left early Monday morning once in a while, you’d still get to your office on time. So, you’d really only be gone Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.” She raised a finger with each day.

He bent over and kissed the raised fingers. “Three days, four days. It doesn’t matter, Caro. That’s a lot of days to be apart.”

She tapped the paper. “But, Nick, it’s only during the school year. We’ll have the summer and holidays together. I can visit you on my breaks.”

He sat back in his chair, his arms folded over his chest. He didn’t like her reasoning, but he was willing to hear her out. “Okay, go on with the list.”

“With the raise you’ll receive and my stipend, we can save toward our house.” She lifted her hand again when he opened his mouth. “I know, I know, it doesn’t sound like we’ll save money, with two places to live. But if we can find you an apartment close to your office, we’ll save on gas money.”

The pros took up the full side of the paper. Only one item was on the con side. “You don’t mind living apart for the year?” he asked.

She fixed him with her look that was just a fraction short of being disgusted. “Nick, it’s just for a few months. And we’ll see each other every weekend.”

She scooted her chair over until she could frame his face with her hands. “Honey, what if this job doesn’t work out? Or you don’t like the town? I’ll have given up this great opportunity for no reason. I want to try it for one year.”

She wasn’t pleading, but he could hear the tremor in her voice. “If I do move with you, I’ll have to get another certificate to teach in Missouri.” She sighed and he felt the motion all the way to his feet. “You know what happened when we moved to Lawrence. I had to work as an aide for a year before a job came open.”

He nodded. “You’re right.” He scooped her into his lap, holding her close. “But what am I going to do when I come home and you’re not there?”

“We’ll talk on the phone. And we’re both always so busy during the week, we hardly see each other in the evening anyway.”

He couldn’t put it into words, but he liked knowing that she was sitting at the dining-room table, her school papers spread around her, while he read through a report or checked on figures. She was always there when he prepared for bed, eager to tell him about her latest meeting or some funny story from her day.

Right now she was warm in his arms. How would he deal with the long nights without her?

“I MADE A COUPLE OF CASSEROLES and put them in the freezer.” Caroline stood next to her car, watching him add her last suitcase to the trunk. “And you have bread and sandwich fixings for the week.”

He caught her shoulders and kissed her mouth, silencing the rest of her words. “Caro, I can take care of myself.”

“Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.” Her brow was puckered in a frown, her gaze darting from the car to the door of the apartment building. “I mean, you lived at home, then we got married and I took care of you—”

His kiss was rougher and when he lifted his head, he was pleased to see the dazed look in her eyes. “I can take care of myself,” he repeated. “Now, you? What will happen if you need a clean blouse in the middle of the week?”

She grinned and tossed her head. Dressed in cutoff shorts and a Mickey Mouse tee shirt, her long blond hair pulled back in a simple ponytail, she looked more like a high-school student than a teacher heading back for a new school year. “I’ll buy a new one and wait until you come home to do the laundry.”

He laughed and spun her around, giving her a soft pat on the derriere when he put her down. “No shopping.” He marched her toward the car, leaning down to open her door. “We’re saving money here, remember? We want to buy a house we can live in together.”

“Okay, okay.” She stood on tiptoe and planted a long kiss on his mouth.

He held her close. The last two months had been a whirlwind of furnishing his small studio apartment and training at the new office. He liked the people and they had responded well to him. The local manager, the oldest son of the company’s owner, had invited them over for dinner. Caroline had discovered a mutual interest in authors with Mrs. Abbott. Their youngest child, an almost kindergartner, had crawled into Caroline’s lap and stayed there until sent to the family room to play with her older siblings.

Caroline had spent her days while he was at the office putting together school materials. Their nights had involved making memories that would last them through the days ahead. In a new place, a new town, she had lost any inhibitions and he sometimes wondered what his neighbors on either side of the apartment thought of the new tenant.

“I feel like your lover and not your wife,” she had whispered to him last night, arms and legs wrapped around each other in the dark, tiny space he would call home for the next ten months. “Grabbing every minute together, until we can sneak away again.”

He had held her close, savoring her scent, her soft skin, committing them to memory for the lonely nights ahead.

Now he tucked her into the car and reached across to fasten her seat belt. “Call me as soon as you get home.”

“I will.”

He shut the door and she rolled down the window. “I love you, Mr. Eddington.”

“Ditto, Mrs. Eddington.”

He watched the car head down the street, waiting until she disappeared from view before going back to his apartment. The place was functional, one large room with a kitchenette built into the wall under the window. They had pushed the double bed into the opposite corner and hidden it behind a wooden screen Caroline had found at a garage sale. She had positioned the flowered couch at an angle from the front door. An easy chair, coffee table and simple entertainment center with a TV and his stereo created the illusion of a living room separate from the other areas.

The apartment felt empty without Caroline. He wandered around, touching the leaves of the potted plant she had placed on the table, straightening a picture she had hung from their honeymoon in Colorado. He had snapped the shot from their cabin porch, the sun casting shadows on the canyon walls across the river. She had surprised him and had it enlarged and framed for their last anniversary.

“So you don’t forget me,” she had said, sitting cross-legged on the bed. They had been eating pizza, the only food available in the town by the time they finished celebrating between the sheets.

“I won’t have time to forget you.” He fed her the last bite of pepperoni. “I’m going to be so busy at work, I won’t have time to think of anything else. Once I’m home, I’ll drop off to sleep.”

He sank onto the sofa, his feet stretched in front of him. He wished he was tired enough to fall asleep right now. The long nights of boisterous lovemaking should have worn him out. Instead, all he could think about was his lonely bed and the long drive ahead for Caroline.

He changed into running shoes and shorts and jogged through the neighborhood, under the shade of the thick oak trees that lined the yards. The apartment building was nestled at the edge of a residential area, the five units catering to those few people in town who didn’t have a house of their own.

A dog barked at him from the back fence of a two-story frame house and he gave a jaunty wave. He hadn’t had time to meet any of his neighbors yet, too eager to savor the time he had with Caroline. He would spend the next few days getting to know them, to become part of this town.

His shower over, he turned on the evening news and slumped on the couch. When the phone rang, he dashed across the room and grabbed the receiver from the wall. “Hello?”

“Hi. I’m home.”

He glanced at the cheery kitchen clock she had placed over the refrigerator. Everywhere he looked, touches of her. He didn’t know if they would provide him with solace or make him regret their decision. “Didn’t take you long,” he said.

“I didn’t stop. And I didn’t speed, thank you very much.”

He grinned and sank to the floor, his back against the wall, the cord of the phone wrapped around his wrist. “Did I say you did?”

“No. But you can’t let it go that I was stopped on our honeymoon. The only time I’ve ever been pulled over, I might add. And I didn’t even get a ticket!”

“The officer gave you a warning ticket.” The yellow slip was packed away with their wedding pictures and license, a reminder of that first trip to Colorado. She had been nervous when the Kansas highway patrolman had come to the window, stating that she had just been married and the name on her driver’s license hadn’t been changed yet. The young officer had given her a warning and said they would be watching her.

Her sniff of indignation sounded over the line. He could imagine her sitting with her legs crossed, her back against the headboard of the bed. “What time do you have to be at school tomorrow?” he asked.

“We’re working in our classrooms. We can go whenever we want. I’ll go in when I wake up.”

“The afternoon, then?”

Another sniff. “I’m not sleeping in that late.”

“Maybe I should call you and wake you up before I go to work.”

“Don’t you dare!”

The bantering went on for several more minutes. He was prone on the floor, the phone pressed against his ear as he said outrageous things to make her laugh. “I should hang up now,” she finally said.

“Yeah.” They were talking late on Sunday night, but the bill would still add up.

“Love you.”

“Ditto.”

“Nick! At least say it over the phone.”

“I did.”

A long sigh. “Sleep tight,” she said. “And have a good day tomorrow.”

He crawled into bed and lay on his back, watching the shadows from the streetlight flicker over the ceiling. Her scent lingered on the pillow next to him and he tugged it into his arms, feeling foolish but comforted at the same time. He was a grown man. He could survive a few days without his wife next to him in bed.

The days at work passed quickly. The owner of the heating and air-conditioning company had opened this second branch three years ago, putting the main responsibilities in the hands of his oldest son. Nick had been chosen to head the marketing department and improve their sales in the region. He pored over reports, looking for ways to help grow the company, papers covering the dinette table he and Caroline had found at a secondhand shop.

He talked to Caroline each evening, after he ran down the streets of his new neighborhood. His running had been relegated to the bottom of his priorities over the last few years. Work and marriage had taken up his time. Now he found the exercise necessary, the sweat and heat he generated helping him forget the empty apartment and the emptier bed.

After covering several miles, he would shower, dial the number of their town house and crawl under the covers. He had replaced the short phone cord with one that reached to all corners of his temporary home. Listening to her chatter about her day while he lay in bed brought her closer.

Not that he could ever tell her how he felt. Except for her “I love you” at the end of each conversation, Caroline never expressed any emotion and certainly never let him know that she missed him. He knew it was foolish, but his pride wouldn’t let him say that he missed her first.

“When are you coming home tomorrow?” she asked after a detailed description of her open house the night before.

He kicked off his running shoes. The phone had been ringing when he came in from his run and he had grabbed it before she hung up. “About tomorrow night—”

“No!” she interrupted. “Nick, you don’t have to work late, do you?”

He dropped his sweaty clothes on the floor and grabbed a towel off the rack, mopping up the sweat dripping from his forehead. “They’re having a picnic to introduce the new employees to the community. I’m expected to be there.”

“Why didn’t they have it earlier? Your boss knew I was going back to Iowa.”

“The picnic isn’t just for our company. The chamber puts it on every year to welcome any new employees that have been hired by the different businesses. They have it in the fall to include the new teachers. I have to be there, Caro. It’s a big deal around here.”

“Fine. Can you leave after it’s over?”

He wanted to. He’d planned to show up, eat a few hot dogs, chum around with the people he was starting to know by name and sight. Then leave and be home by midnight at the latest.

“I don’t think so. There’s a dance, some speeches, lots of mingling. Most people don’t leave until around eleven, I’m told.” Too late to drive three and a half hours. Even if he wanted to see his wife after four days without her.

“Can’t you explain you have to get home to your wife?”

It was the closest she had come to saying she missed him in all of their phone conversations.

“I wish I could, honey. I’ll leave first thing Saturday morning. I’ll be there before you wake up.” He would crawl into their bed, nuzzle the soft skin of her neck, wake her up just enough to rekindle those fires they had been burning all summer.

Her sigh sounded over the line. “We have a fund-raiser for school. A car wash. I took the first shift, from nine to eleven, figuring I’d be there and back before you woke up.”

He stretched out on the bed, the towel wrapped around his waist. “Then I’ll be waiting for you when you come home.”

THE WEEKEND WAS BUSY. Except for several hours in bed after she came home from the car wash, her hair wet and her skin slippery and soapy from the kids’ antics, their time together was spent on household chores. He caught up on the bills, ran a few loads of laundry, helped her stop a leak in the shower. She made what she expected to be a quick trip to the grocery and ended up stuck in the weekend crowd. They had considered a movie but decided Saturday date night wouldn’t give them any privacy.