The Necklace - The Dusky Club, June 1962 - Linda S Rice (books to read fiction txt) 📗

him have his way with you, did you? Good for you!”

Lynn looked at Mindy. “No! Not good for her at all! She wasn’t supposed to fall in love. We have to leave on Friday, and I think it would be better to leave now before things get complicated or worse.”

“Worse? What’s so bad about having sex and being in love?”

“Nothing is wrong with being in love, as long as you’re in love with the right person...and at the right time,” Lynn said, turning to scowl at Susan. Lynn wasn’t very good at scowling, making Susan want to laugh.

“You can’t always pick the right time, you know...it just happens,” said Mindy.

“Oh, I know that, but this is different. She shouldn’t be sleeping with him, and she shouldn’t be in love! Once we leave, we can never come back...and that’s the problem.”

Mindy sat back and contemplated what Lynn had said.

“Well, of course, you have to come back after your history tour!” said Mindy, turning towards Susan. “It’ll break his heart in a million pieces if you don’t come back.”

Susan looked down. “I’d like to come back...” she sighed.

“Well, you know darn well you can’t! You know there’s no history tour! You know you made it all up!” Lynn said.

Mindy looked stunned. “What’s this all about then? No such thing as a history tour?”

Susan looked angrily at Lynn. “Stop it, Lynn!” She turned to Mindy. “She’s just saying that because she’s not interested in history like I am, and her parents made her come; she didn’t want to.”

“Stop with the lies, Suz...really! This is just going to end badly, and we both know it! Plus, it’s wrong, wrong, wrong!”

“Well, before you start lecturing me, why don’t you tell me what you’ve been up to with Ian? I heard he was missing today when the boys were supposed to go to an audition. Well?”

Lynn blushed.

“Ah, ha! I know what that blush means! You got here last night, right? You haven’t been doing something like a ‘tumble in the sheets’ as they say here, have you?”

Lynn’s face turned even pinker. “Now, Suz...I couldn’t find you...and the, um, the opportunity just presented itself...” Her voice faded.

Susan smiled triumphantly. “So, then...Here you are, probably having sex every five minutes too...and you’re lecturing me?!”

“But I’m not in love! I’m just...well...”

Mindy was looking back and forth between them, not understanding fully what they were talking about.

The song ended, and Susan saw James take off his guitar. She leaped up and ran over to him.

“Can we leave now, please? I told your dad we’d be back for dinner, and I’d help him.”

“Dinner? We’re having dinner with my dad?”

“Yes, it’s supposed to be a surprise for you.”

He looked at her and smiled. “That’s nice of you. I think my dad is becoming very fond of you.”

She turned around and saw Lynn talking to Mindy, waving her arms around in the air. She saw her take her iPhone out of her purse and show it to Mindy. Mindy had a puzzled look on her face. Susan had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“Can we leave now, please?” she asked. “Right now, please? I can talk to Lynn more tonight.”

He looked at her oddly, then said, “Sure, if that’s what you want.” He wondered what had made her so agitated.

When they were both in his car, he turned to her and again asked her if something was wrong. She assured him she was fine, just still a little shook up over the attack in the alley and a bit anxious over the dinner and wanting to make sure it was perfect for him.

“Well, that’s as it should be...” he thought. “Making things perfect for me…”

Susan would have been annoyed if she’d known what he was thinking. Male chauvinist...

 

Chapter Thirteen

The Perfect Dinner

Susan was still agitated and seemed nervous when they arrived at James’s house. James asked her again what was bothering her, but she told him not to be silly. She was just anxious about dinner, was all.

Mel had put the beef roast in the oven as Susan had directed him and the potatoes were on the boil. Susan immediately went into the kitchen, popped the bread in the oven, and started on the Crème Brulee.

“You don’t happen to have a blowtorch, do you?” she asked, looking at Mel, eyebrows raised.

“A blowtorch? And what would you need a blowtorch for?”

“To caramelize the sugar on top of the custard when it’s done,” she replied as if it were the simplest thing in the world.

“Well, yes, I do have a small blowtorch I use to repair the plumbing from time to time. You want to use it on the custard then?”

“If you don’t mind,” she said, whipping the eggs and cream together, then adding the vanilla to the cream mixture.

James watched and listened, a bemused expression on his face.

“You’re in the way,” she said, looking at him. “Go play the piano or something.”

He gave her a quirky smile. “Certainly, my lady,” he said with a small bow.

Mel looked amused. “Have him wrapped around your little finger, don’t you?”

“I wouldn’t say that.”

“Well, certainly looks like it to me. I find it quite amusing. A different side of Jimmie, that’s for sure.”

She threw her head back and laughed, forgetting about Lynn and what she might be saying to Mindy. She certainly wouldn’t be able to tell her the truth. Mindy would never believe it.

The iPhone was the problem, however. What would Mindy think of the iPhone? Would Lynn show Derek and Ian? What had been going on between Lynn and Ian anyway? She’d caught the unmistakable way Ian had looked lustfully at Lynn, knowing they must have been together intimately, especially considering Lynn’s blushes.

She dashed the thought from her mind and concentrated on putting the custard into glass cups she’d found in a cabinet and placing them in a water bath before putting in the oven with the roast and bread. She heaved a great sigh. There was barely enough room.

“Something troubling you, dear?” asked Mel, who’d been observing her while setting the kitchen table for dinner. She could hear James at the piano in the lounge, playing another Scott Joplin tune.

“No...no...nothing at all...just worried about getting everything right. I’m a bit of a perfectionist...” she said, taking the salad out of the refrigerator, tossing it with the vinaigrette then dividing it onto three salad plates.

“I think you might be too good for him, you know.”

Susan raised her eyebrows. “Oh! How can you say such a thing?” she asked, now hearing James dabbling at the piano, the notes of “All My Kisses” reaching her ears. She did her best to act normal even though her heart was pounding, and she felt rather faint.

“You just seem so much wiser for your years. You know so many things...gardening, cooking, music, taking care of household things...and you talk so sophisticated-like...we’re just simple people...”

“I’m nothing special, Mel. I was just raised by my grandparents, that’s all. They’re from the old school. Women need to know a lot of things early...the domesticated things...my grandfather is insisting that I go to college, but I’ve really been raised just to get married and have babies.”

“Is that what you want to do?” he asked, brightening.

“No, not at all. I have too rebellious of a spirit. I couldn’t be under any man’s thumb. That’s why I thought it was so funny when you said I had James wrapped around my finger. I don’t think he’s the type to let a woman rule him. I always have to have my way, and so does he. That would be a problem.”

Mel was thoughtful. “You’re probably right,” he thought. “If those two end up together, there will certainly be a lot of fireworks between them…But, fireworks will often calm down to burning embers…”

Susan opened the oven and took out the roast, removing it to a platter to let the juices settle, then set the roasting pan on a stove burner and lit the gas to make gravy. She stirred some cold water into the flour with some salt and then added it to the pan's drippings. She stirred and added water until it was the right consistency, then turned the stove burner down to low. Checking the green beans, she saw they were perfectly tender. She turned off the burner and removed the pan from the stove then took the bread out of the oven.

“Can you please slice the bread?” she asked Mel as she set the salad plates on the table. “I’ll go get James.”

She walked out of the kitchen and came up behind him at the piano, wrapping her arms around him as he started into her favorite song again.

“Close your eyes while I touch you…

You know how I love you…

Remember me while you’re away…

And then while you are gone…

I will try to go on…

And send all my kisses your way…”

He stopped. “So, what do you think,” he asked. “Will you remember me every day when you’re on your tour?”

She wanted to cry. It was like a knife pierced her heart as the reality of leaving hit her full force.

“Stop!” she screamed silently. “Don’t even think about leaving! Don’t think about it...not now...not now...!”

“Dinner’s ready, Sir James,” she said softly into his ear, avoiding his question.

When they went into the kitchen, Mel was slicing the roast, and Susan went to mash the potatoes, adding a generous amount of butter and the bit of whipping cream she’d saved from the Crème Brulee. She checked the clock. Another forty minutes on the custard.

Everything was on the table, and they sat down to eat. James and Mel looked at each other, contemplating the extravagant feast before them. They’d never seen the likes of it. After Sherry died, money became tight for the family without her income as a nurse. They’d had to adapt very frugal measures to get by.

“Well, dig in!” Susan said, looking at them both a bit shyly, wondering if Mel would like her cooking as much as James seemed to.

“Fabulous!” said Mel after a few moments. James just smiled, nodding in agreement.

As the meal came to an end, Susan jumped up to check on the custard. It was done. She removed the tray with the glass cups from the oven and set it on the counter to cool a bit, then she went to gather the dishes.

“Mel, can you please get the blowtorch now, then why don’t you guys go in the other room and play something else on the piano? Scott Joplin would be nice. I’ll take care of cleaning up the kitchen, and then we can have dessert.”

“I don’t know if I can handle dessert as stuffed full as I am,” said Mel, walking outside to the potting shed, where he kept the blowtorch and a box of other tools. He was back a minute later and showed Susan how to use the torch. “You sure you don’t want me to do this for you?”

“Positive. I’ve done this a lot before. You and James just go and relax.”

She put the leftovers in the fridge, washed the dishes, dried them then put everything away. She wiped down the kitchen table and counters, swept the floor before firing up the blowtorch, and held it over the sugar she’d sprinkled on top of the custard. When everything was done, she went into the lounge where James and his dad were companionably playing the piano together. She smiled at the picture they presented.

“Okay, I’m sure