“I know,” Georgeanne said easily.
“Good. Now, tell me. How did you first meet John Kowalsky?”
“Do you want the whole story?”
“Yep.”
“Okay. Do you remember when I first met you, I was wearing a little pink dress?”
“Yes. You were supposed to marry Virgil Duffy in that dress.”
“That’s right.” Years ago Georgeanne had told Mae of her botched wedding plans to Virgil, but she’d left out the part about John. She told Mae now. She told her all of it. All except the private details. She’d never been a person to talk openly and freely about sex. Her grandmother had certainly never discussed it, and everything she’d learned, she’d learned from a health class at school, or from inept boyfriends who either hadn’t known or hadn’t cared about giving pleasure.
Then she’d met John, and he’d taught her things she hadn’t thought were physically possible until that night. He’d set her ablaze with his hot hands and hungry mouth, and she’d touched him in ways she’d only heard whispered about. He’d made her want him so much, she’d done everything he’d suggested and then some.
Now she didn’t even like to think of that night. She no longer recognized the young woman who’d given her body and her love so easily. That woman didn’t exist anymore, and she didn’t feel there was any reason to discuss her.
She skipped over the lurid details, then told Mae of the conversation she’d had with John that morning and of the agreement they’d reached at his houseboat. “I don’t know how things are going to work out, I just pray Lexie doesn’t get hurt,” she concluded, suddenly feeling exhausted.
“Are you going to tell Charles?” Mae asked.
“I don’t know,” she answered as she hugged the pillow to her chest, leaned her head against the back of the couch, and stared up at the ceiling. “I’ve only been out with him twice.”
“Are you going to see him again?”
Georgeanne thought of the man she’d dated for the past month. She’d met him when he’d hired Heron’s to cater his daughter’s tenth birthday. He’d called the next day and they’d met for dinner at The Four Seasons. Georgeanne smiled. “I hope so.”
“Then you better tell him.”
Charles Monroe was divorced and one of the nicest men Georgeanne had ever known. He owned a local cable station, was wealthy, and had a wonderful smile that lit up his gray eyes. He didn’t dress flashy. He wasn’t GQ gorgeous, and his kisses didn’t set her eyebrows on fire. They were more like a warm breeze. Nice. Relaxing.
Charles never pushed or grabbed, and given more time, Georgeanne could see herself becoming involved in an intimate relationship with him. She liked him a lot, and just as important, Lexie had met him once, and she liked him, too. “I guess I’ll tell him.”
“I don’t think he’s going to like this news one bit,” Mae predicted.
Georgeanne rolled her head to the left and looked at her friend. “Why?”
“Because even though I abhor violent men, John Kowalsky is a stud boy, and Charles is bound to be jealous. He might worry that there is still something between you and the hockey jock.”
She figured that Charles might get upset with her because she’d told him her standard lie about Lexie’s father, but she wasn’t worried he’d be jealous. “Charles has nothing to worry about,” she said with the certainty of a woman who knew for a fact that there wasn’t even a remote possibility she would ever become romantically involved with John again. “And besides, even if I were so delusional as to fall for John, he hates me. He doesn’t even like to look at me.” The idea of a reunion between herself and John was so absurd that she didn’t waste any brain power giving it a second thought. “I’ll tell Charles when I have lunch with him on Thursday.”
But four days later, when she met Charles at a bistro on Madison Street, she didn’t get a chance to tell him anything. Before she could explain what had happened with John, Charles hit her with a proposal that left her speechless.
“What do you think about hosting your own live television show?” he asked over pastrami sandwiches and coleslaw. “A kind of Martha Stewart of the Northwest. We’d slip
you into the Saturday twelve-thirty-to-one time slot. That’s just after Margie’s Garage and right before our afternoon sports programming. You’d have the freedom to do what you wanted. You could cook one show, and the next you could arrange dried flowers or retile a kitchen.”
“I can’t retile a kitchen,” she whispered, shocked clear down to her beige pumps.
“I just threw that out as an idea. I trust you. You’ve got natural talent, and you’d look great on television.”
Georgeanne placed a hand on her chest, and her voice squeaked when she said, “Me?”
“Yes, you. When I talked it over with my station manager, she thought it was a great idea.” Charles gave her an encouraging smile, and she almost believed she could go in front of a television camera and host her own show. Charles’s offer did appeal to the creative side of her, but reality interceded. Georgeanne was dyslexic. She’d learned to compensate, but if she wasn’t careful, she still read the words wrong. If she was flustered, she still had to stop and think about which way was left and which was right. And then there was her weight. A camera was supposed to add five pounds to a person. Well, Georgeanne was already several pounds overweight, add five pounds to that, and not only would she appear on TV reading words that didn’t exist, but she’d look fat. Plus there was Lexie to consider. Georgeanne already felt horrible for the amount of time her daughter spent in day care or with sitters.
She looked into Charles’s gray eyes and said, “No, thank you.”
“Aren’t you going to think it over?”