“So you’re afraid of making a fool of yourself,” she said.
“I have said enough.”
“And that’s why you try to act so bristly and cold and highfalutin. So no one gets inside.”
In an effort at deflection he asked, “Is it that you have studied the psychologie?”
She flatly stated, “I just listen to Doctor Laura on the radio. Oh, and hot tip, Pierre: Don’t ever call in.”
Soulfully gazing into her eyes, he said, “She could teach me about my heart’s desire.”
“Which is?”
Without smiling, he quoted her. “To love and be loved.”
Iona smiled. “Clever boy.”
“Really, Iona. I think it is so.”
“Well, I’m touched.”
“And you?” he asked. “Who are you, Iona?”
“The facts?”
“We begin there.”
“I’m twenty-three years old. Raised in Seldom. My mom passed when I was a girl, and my dad was off in Timbuktu by then, so I’ve been halfways on my own for ages. Brownies, Girl Scouts, Four-H Club. Went to high school over in Three Pillows. I was a football cheerleader in the fall, a gymnast in winter, and played girl’s softball in the spring. And I have a letter sweater to prove it. Mister Tupper coached us. Average student. I’ve had nine semi-cute boyfriends since puberty, and only three broken hearts. Oh, and I was queen of the Snowflake Frolic and the Senior Prom. Attended Metro Tech Community College, Associate of Arts degree, and then I got a job at Mutual of Omaha. Shared an apartment with three other girls. We quarreled all the time. Ran out of hot water every morning. Went into credit card debt, shopping just to soothe the melancholy, and decided Seldom wasn’t so bad. I’ve been back with my grandma for three months now.”
“Madame Christiansen. Très gentille.”
“She is. I love her to pieces, but she thinks things ought to be the way they were when she was a girl. She caught me with a guy in my Omaha apartment and she got so stricken! Like I was defiled.” She paused. “I’m afraid of being a fallen woman. And my heart’s desire is to fall for someone.”
The sand bunkers that fronted the sixteenth green were half a wedge shot away. Pierre sought a sympathetic response. But he sought in vain. “It is never easy, is it,” he said.
Iona noticed his vague detachment and said, “Here I am griping and doing the poor-me bit and tiring you out with the translating.”
He admitted, “English is a difficult language for me. I have not the. . . vocabulaire. I feel stupide?”
“But you’re not! I can tell. Which words were you hunting for?”
Pierre frowned with thoughtfulness and asked, “How does one say in English, ‘You have beautiful breasts’?”
Iona blushed as she looked down at her shirt and said, “Exactly like that.” After a pause, she said, “I’ll bet it’s prettier in French though.”
Pierre haughtily said, “Of course.” His hand went to her blonde hair. “The hairs. . . les cheveux.” He floated both hands onto her face and she turned it against his right palm. “Your eyes so blue . . . les yeux couleur d’azurs.” His right thumb lightly traced her lips as he whispered, “The mouth . . . la bouche.” And his mouth neared hers as he said, “The kiss . . . le baiser.” They kissed and she seemed to swoon a little. Pierre theatrically withdrew from her and settled onto the freshly mown fairway, and she got down on the fairway, too, lying half on top of him, one thigh beside his, her forearms propping her up off his chest, a hand toying with his wild mane of hair. A moon of pearl was shining down on them.
Iona asked, “How do you say you’ve got a crush on somebody?”
“A. . . crush?”
“Say you’re romantic about someone you just met.”
Pierre replied meaningfully, “J’ai le béguin pour toi.”
She said as if just practicing it, “J’ai le béguin pour toi.” She smiled shyly. “Handsome language.”
“Yes,” he said. “Very pretty.”